


The Sun Rises

by zhiantara



Category: A Court of Thorns and Roses Series - Sarah J. Maas
Genre: F/M, Romance, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-12
Updated: 2018-04-22
Packaged: 2019-02-13 19:29:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 41,248
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12990960
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zhiantara/pseuds/zhiantara
Summary: Fate has tied their souls together; now they just need to get to know each other. (Post-ACOWAR Elucien fic, rated for future chapters.)





	1. Chapter 1

_A few weeks before Hybern’s fall_

 

Elain stared into inky blackness darker than a moonless night. No light reflected off its surface, no breeze or breath stirred it. But something waited beneath. It called to her without words. It sang to her.

The Cauldron whispered her name.

She did not fight. She did not bother to scream. She’d had this nightmare before, and she knew how it would end.

They threw her in, and she sank into the darkness. There was no color, no light, only the void that wrapped around her too tightly. It had a voice that was cold but somehow lilting, like a child that toyed with a baby bird, heedless of the strength in its grip.

_Sweet thing, pretty thing, won’t you let me have you? Let me break you open and rip out all of that dirty humanity._

Elain curled up and threw her arms over her head. _Please,_ she thought.

 _Sweet thing, my precious babe,_ it cooed. _You were meant to be more than this. Let me reforge you._

Invisible tendrils wrapped around her ribs. They would be in her throat soon. _Please let it end here. Just let me drown._

The water was in her mouth now, and it was roiling with all the heat of a forge. Down her throat it bubbled. It was in this part, as in all the nights before, all the way back to the waking nightmare of the event itself--this part, where she thought the Cauldron might grant her wish. Where it might drown her at last.

_Sweet, pretty thing. These are the waters of all creation. In them, you will be reborn._

Every bone, every muscle, every piece of her erupted in agony.

Yes, she remembered as she threw her head back in a silent scream, the nightmare was the same as always.

Except for that golden light glowing in the distance.

The pain still ripped through her, but she kept her eyes on the golden light. It grew steadily brighter, and around and within it more colors awoke--reds and pinks and oranges. The colors of a sunrise.

She felt a gentle tug in her belly. A beckoning. A question.

She almost didn’t dare to hope. She’d never managed to pull herself from this nightmare before. But then, she’d never seen that light here before.

She flung her hand out, grasping, as if she could touch the light--

And then her feet were on soft ground, soil and grass beneath her. Those sunrise hues that had reached out to her within the Cauldron were spread across the sky beyond.

Her gaze moved on its own from the dawn over the hills, and before her stretched a field of endless colors, yellows and reds and purples and blues and so many more in so many shades, all of them kissed by the gentle golden glow of the rising sun. She focused on the petals making up that colorful field; the flowers sat atop tall, straight stalks like wine glasses.

Tulips. She stood before a field of tulips that stretched so far into the distance that the blooms seemed to become no more than a vibrant carpet upon the hills.

Elain could have stared at it forever.

But her eye wandered again of its own accord, toward a figure standing amidst the flowers, between rows of purple and blue. He had the rounded ears of a human, his brown hair peppered with grey. He hobbled slightly on one leg as he turned to face her.

Her father, surrounded by tulips, smiled at her.

His lips moved, but she could not hear his words. It did not matter. She gazed at him and the swaying flowers and the painted sky, until the image was burned into her memory.

-

Elain opened her eyes.

Her face was wet, and her blankets had been strewn all over the bed and onto the floor; but her heart beat slow and steady. Her hand had moved to her stomach, and now she traced little circles over it. She turned her head towards the window. With her new immortal sight, she could glimpse through the spaces between the tightly clustered buildings of Velaris and to the sky beyond.

The sun was rising.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> An alternative title for this would be "a whole bunch of stuff that will be probably be retconned one way or another when the novella comes out." I'm sure there are many other Elucien fics along this same vein, I just wanted to get this one out of my system. :)
> 
> This is my first ACOTAR fic, and my first fic in quite a few years, so I apologize if anything seems off in the writing or canon depiction.
> 
> Thank you very much for reading!


	2. Chapter 2

_Velaris_

 

Lucien stared at the door leading out to the townhouse garden for far longer than was proper. He kept his gaze focused on the door knob and not on what lay beyond the window. He didn’t need to look to know that she was out there. Her gentle presence lingered constantly on the other end of the bridge that linked them together. The mating bond.

_You’re my mate._

A dozen curses tore through his mind, only the most recent bout of self-flagellation that he’d subjected himself to the past few months. What had happened, that day in Hyburn, to the skilled diplomat he’d made himself into? The one who was so careful with his speech, who had honed and wielded his words as the finest weapon in his arsenal? What had made him so careless that day as to blurt out what might have been the deadliest statement of his life?

It was not just the carelessness of his actions, as a High Lord’s most unwanted son announcing his new weakness to the world, that haunted him. He had not even considered what the words would mean for that trembling girl, surrounded by enemies, forced into a new body, a new life. What had he been to her then, if not some brute laying claim to her? No wonder she had avoided him for so long.

Today was his first day back in Velaris since Hybern’s fall. He’d helped tend to the injured humans, and Tamlin had even accepted his aid in leading members of the Spring Court back from the Summer lands and repairing some of the damage that Hyburn had done. Tamlin had hardly spoken a word to him for the week he spent there, which neither surprised nor upset Lucien. He had not hoped for better and had honestly expected worse. There was no going back for them. Lucien would mourn the loss of that friendship, the loss of the person Tamlin had once been, but that week he’d spent in the Spring Court, it did not feel like home. Maybe it never had been. Maybe his time there had been no more than an interlude, a convenient and comfortable stopping point for the lonely vagrant that he could no longer deny being.

But here he was, back in Velaris. Because Elain had suggested it, the last time they saw each other--though he was sure it had only been because of Feyre’s nudge, but Elain had not sounded reluctant. Lucien still trusted his own judgement enough to know that. In any case, the carefully wrapped bundle in his left hand reminded him, he had a request he needed to fulfill.

The sound of soft footsteps reached his ears, and he looked up in time to see Elain approach the door in front of him and open it.

“Were you waiting for an invitation?” she asked with a little smile.

Lucien thought his face might catch fire. He cleared his throat but could find no words that would save him from the embarrassment. He scratched the back of his head and mumbled, “Sorry. Nerves.”

Mercifully, she didn’t question him further but simply opened the door wider to allow him to walk out. He followed her to the small wrought iron table where she’d been sitting with a book, a tea set, and some little snacks on a plate. He sat down across from her, keeping the bundle in his lap.

“Would you like some tea?” she asked. A frown appeared that did nothing to mar her beautiful features. “Although it might be cold now.”

Lucien gestured towards the teapot. “May I?” She cocked her head, and he realized she didn’t catch his meaning. He pressed his fingertips lightly against the porcelain, near the bottom of the teapot. His fingertips began to glow, as if embers smoldered beneath his skin. It was a simple trick, one of the first that his mother had taught him. Her mastery of Autumn’s flames nearly surpassed that of her husband, though Beron did not often let her wield them. Lucien pushed that thought aside--it would only make his flames burn hotter, and it would not do for him to be shattering teapots here in Elain’s peaceful garden.

He held his fingers in place until tendrils of steam twisted out of the spout. “Oh,” Elain gasped. Lucien gave her a small smile as he lifted the teapot and filled two cups. His golden eye caught her glancing at the plate of snacks as her brows furrowed. No doubt her kind heart and good breeding fought the urge to offer him some, knowing as she must have all the weight that now went with such an offering.

Lucien spared her the anxiety by speaking in a low tone, “I’m not hungry.”

She let out the breath she’d been holding. Guilt twisted in his stomach. What other anxious thoughts had he caused her to have? He could have spared her so much had he only kept his damned mouth shut.

After sipping his tea, he said, “I suppose Feyre warned you about that?”

Elain nodded. “I think she wanted to spare me from any… awkwardness. She’s very protective, you see.” She cradled her teacup close to her face, breathing in the steam. “Silly, isn’t it? She’s my little sister, yet she’s always the one protecting me. And even Nesta, as much as Nesta ever needs protecting.”

Lucien schooled his features as he tried not to think of his own siblings, how it might have been if any of them had possessed Feyre’s desire to protect. “I don’t think Feyre minds. It’s in her nature.”

He wondered if he had not hidden his sorrow as well as he’d thought when Elain said, her eyes wide with curiosity, “She told me you have brothers.”

When no question followed the statement, Lucien turned his gaze to the murky liquid in his cup. It was a black tea of some sort, with a hint of rose. “What else did she tell you about them?”

“Not much, but… she said they were not kind to you.”

He gave her a strained smile and said slowly, “I would say that about sums it up.” It was, if anything, an understatement. But it was not a conversation he was ready to have with her, not yet. He wasn’t ready for her to see just how many broken pieces there were to him. “You look better,” he said, then quickly added, “not that you looked bad before, you looked beautiful, it’s just--”

“I feel much better,” she interrupted his babbling with a smile, and he marveled at her capacity for mercy. “I think… I think I still have a ways to go, but it’s getting easier every day.”

“I heard about what happened with your--” He clenched his jaw and fought back the wave of anger and jealousy that came when he thought of the next word. “--your fiance.” He cursed the mating bond, not for the first time, for the way its primal nature overwhelmed all his guile and rationality; he pushed past it as he turned a sympathetic frown on Elain. “I’m sorry. Truly. I know that--I know that you loved him. If it had to end, I wish it had not ended so… cruelly.”

She took a sip of her tea and set it down on the table. “Thank you,” she whispered. “I’ve had a lot of time to think about it. And I think… I think it’s for the best, in the end. I still love him, or maybe now I only love the idea of him. But if he’d really loved me, he would have loved me as I am.”

His heart roared with all the things he wanted to say to that. But for her sake, he kept those thoughts to himself. Instead he said softly, “I won’t claim to understand what you’re going through. But I do know… I know what it is to lose someone you love. I wish I had an answer, an antidote for you. I wish that I could say the centuries make it easier.” It took all his courage to meet her gaze then. “But I can say with certainty that he is a fool for throwing away such a gift.”

He heard her heartbeat quicken, and he thought he might melt through the chair at the warmth in her brown eyes. “I hope you’ll tell me about her someday.”

He almost choked on the word. “Someday.”

Elain took a deep breath, and her shoulders loosened as she released it. She nodded at the bundle in his lap. “Are you going to tell me what that is?”

Lucien felt as though his heart had turned to lead. He carefully placed the bundle on the table in front of her. “It’s for you. From your father.” Her hand went to her chest. “He gave it to me for safe keeping. He’d hoped to give it to you himself, but…”

Her eyes shone as she slowly, reverently unwrapped the bundle. She let out a quiet sob at the object within: a carved wooden tulip.

It almost seemed wrong to speak, to even be here as she beheld her father’s gift, but he said anyway, “Elain, I’m so sorry.” He’d whispered the same sympathy to Feyre earlier, when he’d given her the carved paintbrush their father had made. He didn’t know what Nesta’s bundle contained, as he’d not had the nerve to give it to her directly and had instead left it with a very quiet Feyre.

Elain picked up the wooden flower as if it was made of glass. “He must’ve been practicing,” she said through her tears. “It’s much better than what he would make when--” Another sob cut her off.

Every nerve and muscle in his body wanted to launch at her, to wrap his arms around her and stroke her soft hair until her tears ceased. But he could not lose control, not now, not ever. She deserved better than some animal flinging itself at her.

Still, he couldn’t bear to sit by while she wept. Slowly, he stood from his chair and moved to kneel on the ground beside her. He didn’t dare touch her; instead, he put his hand on the table beside her, an offering. His heart leapt to his throat when she instantly took hold of his hand.

“He was a good man,” said Lucien, gently stroking her thumb with his. “There was sorrow behind his eyes, but kindness and cleverness as well. I was glad to have known him, even if it was only for a short while.”

“Did you spend much time with him?” Her tear-filled eyes were so bright, like the fur of a newborn fawn. “Did you keep him company?”

Lucien nodded. “For much of the time that I was gone, yes.”

She let out a sigh, as if with relief. “I’m so glad. I’m so glad he wasn’t alone. I’m glad neither of you were alone.” He squeezed her hand. But even as her tears subsided, so did her smile. “Did you… did you tell him about…”

He loosened his grip on her hand. “No. But I think he realized, at least, that I… that you were important to me. I think I listened a bit too intently whenever he spoke about you.”

He expected her to grow tense, wary; but instead she shifted in her seat to face him fully. “What did he say about me?”

Lucien met her gaze and smiled. “He told me about your childhood. About your favorite flowers. How you loved tulips most of all, how he wanted to bring you to the continent to see them. He told me you took singing lessons when you were young but that you rarely sang these days. He told me about the time when you all lived in that hovel, and some field mouse ran up into your skirts, and you were absolutely terrified but you didn’t want to harm the poor thing, so you just stood there sobbing while Feyre and Nesta tried to shake it out.”

She burst out laughing even as fresh tears rolled down her cheeks. Lucien thought it was the most beautiful sound he’d ever heard. “Oh, what an awful story, I can’t believe he told you about that!”

He was keenly aware of the hand that still held his, her touch like the warmth of the sun, like joy itself. “He also said that each of his daughters had their own special strength. Feyre’s determination, Nesta’s cold cunning… He said that you had this wonderful way of finding the light even in the darkest of places. And if you could not find the light, you would spark it yourself.”

Her smile was sad as she rotated the wooden flower between her fingertips. “It’s been harder to find that light these days.” Her brows pressed together and her eyes grew distant, unfocused, like she was trying to glimpse something far away. “I have this dream. A nightmare, really. Of when I was thrown into the Cauldron. It’s always the same--I get thrown in, and the darkness overtakes me, and the Cauldron whispers to me, and the pain, the same pain I felt then… It always ends with my body getting torn apart. It’s always the same--except for a few weeks ago, I was pulled out by this beautiful light. And the darkness vanished, and I saw a field of tulips. And my father was there. It was the best dream I have ever had.” Her eyes returned to his. “Only it wasn’t a dream, was it?”

Lucien had quite forgotten how to breathe. “I wasn’t sure if it reached you.”

“Why did you show it to me?” There was no accusation in her voice, only real curiosity.

He swallowed hard. “I can feel when you’re having that nightmare. Through the bond, I can feel your pain and your sadness. I felt it while I was staring out at that field of flowers, flowers your father had said you’d always wanted to see. And I couldn’t bear it. I couldn’t bear that you were in such pain while I was seeing something so wonderful. And because… I thought it might bring you some comfort. I thought it might make you happy.”

“It did,” she whispered. “It still does.”

He let out a long, shaky breath. “I’m glad.”

“Thank you, Lucien.” Fire raced through his veins at the sound of his name on her lips. “For bringing me this, and for… thank you.”

“After everything you went through--” _After everything I put you through--_ “It’s the least I could do.”

She took her hand away from his--his skin felt like ice in the absence of hers--so that she could wipe away her tears.

Lucien got to his feet and cleared his throat, though his voice was still thick when he spoke. “I should go. Rhys wants to speak with me--a debriefing, I suppose.”

Before he could struggle to think of an appropriate farewell, she asked in a rush, “Will you be coming back here?”

His eyes widened. “I… well, I’m afraid I don’t have anywhere else to go at the moment. But apparently Rhys has given me a generous salary, much more than I’m worth. I think he must’ve been giving me hazard pay while I was on the continent. I don’t have enough money for my own place just yet, but I’ll try to clear out as soon as I can.”

She shot to her feet. “I wouldn’t mind if you stayed!” Lucien didn’t bother to hide his shock, though he hoped his joy was not as obvious. “If you’re thinking you have to leave for my sake--you really don’t.” She clasped the wooden flower close to her chest. “Unless… unless you want to leave, of course.”

Lucien took half a step closer to her, his hand reaching out, before he stopped himself. “I thought you might want some space. From me.”

She was silent for a moment. She seemed to consider her next words carefully. “I don’t know you very well. And I know that’s mostly my own fault, but…”

When she trailed off, he said, “I understand. Why you stayed away--I understand.”

Elain frowned. “Do you?”

He shrugged. Wasn’t it obvious? “Because I’m a one-eyed beast who was complicit in your kidnapping? Because the first thing I ever said to you was--” His breath caught in his throat, and he couldn’t look at her anymore. “I’m sorry,” he murmured. “For everything that happened, for the part I played in it--I’m sorry.”

He heard her take the few steps to close the distance between them, and she tilted her head so that she could capture his gaze. “That’s not how I see you, you know. As ‘a beast.’ And if that’s what you think of yourself, well… it’s terribly unkind.”

Lucien stared at her, at the faint freckles scattered over her nose and cheeks, her long lashes, the curve of her lips, and he wondered if there would ever come a time where that face wouldn’t shred his heart to pieces. One corner of his mouth lifted as he tried to smile for her. “Sorry. Old habits.”

Several quiet heartbeats passed before she spoke again. “There’s a garden by the river.” Lucien quirked an eyebrow at the sudden statement, but she went on, “Feyre said it was damaged when the city was attacked a few months ago. Some of the plants were burnt or destroyed. No one’s gotten around to replanting any of it yet, and she said I could go fix it up a bit if I wanted. I think she wants me to leave the house, to be honest, but I don’t know this city, and I didn’t want to go alone, and--” She stopped herself with a long breath. She’d been rambling, Lucien realized, and a real smile tugged at his lips. Elain squared her shoulders and asked, “If I go tomorrow, would you join me?”

Lucien couldn’t find the words to reply. He was still trying to process her question, trying to decide if he’d misheard her, if she really did want to spend time with him.

Realizing his hesitation, Elain added quickly, “You don’t have to help if you don’t want to, I just… thought it might be nice to have some company.”

He couldn’t fight the grin spreading across his face. “I would love to.” She returned his grin with a dazzling one of her own. “Although I should warn you, I’m not much of a gardener. But I’m very good at following directions.”

“Tomorrow, then? After breakfast?”

“I look forward to it.”

He bowed to her, and though he was certain he looked utterly ridiculous with that unabashed grin on his face, he didn’t try to wipe it away. He couldn’t, not with how happy Elain looked, not when his own shoulders felt lighter than they had in centuries.

-

Elain waited until her keen ears heard the front door of the townhouse close, until she felt through that tether in her stomach that Lucien was no longer nearby. She went inside, still clutching her father’s flower. She found Feyre in the sitting room, curled up on the couch with a book in her lap. Her long fingers caressed a carved wooden paint brush that she balanced upon her knees. Feyre looked up and smiled as Elain entered the room.

Before Feyre could even open her mouth to greet her, Elain blurted, “Tell me about the mating bond.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I actually meant to post this at the same time as the prologue WHOOPS.
> 
> Thank you for reading!! You are all so lovely. <3


	3. Chapter 3

Feyre’s eyes went wide. “Elain, what--”

“Tell me everything I need to know.” Elain rushed over to sit beside her sister. She leaned in close and let the words pour out of her like a waterfall. “All you’ve told me is that I can’t give him food, because it would mean I accept the bond. But I don’t even know what the bond _is_ , or where it came from, or what it means. I don’t know what I’m supposed to _do_.”

Feyre’s gaze hardened. “Nothing. Elain, believe me when I say you don’t have to _do_ anything about the bond.”

Elain bit her lip and reached for Feyre’s hand. “Please… I just want to understand it better. I know you’re trying to protect me, but protect me by keeping me informed. I don’t like that everyone else seems to know more about this than I do!”

Feyre’s shoulders slumped as she let out a sigh. The steel in her eyes melted away to stormy grey skies. “I’m sorry. You’re right.” She straightened. “I can only tell you what it’s been like for me. I think it’s different for everyone--every pair.”

When Feyre paused, Elain asked, “What was it like when you found out? How did you feel?”

A shadow seemed to pass over her face. “I was furious. It was perhaps the most important thing in my new life, and Rhys had hidden it from me for months.” She squeezed her eyes shut for a moment, and her voice softened to a whisper. “I was so cruel to him after I found out the truth. It took me awhile before I could forgive him, but eventually I understood. Maybe he could have told me sooner, but I realized he was so afraid. And he didn’t want to make things harder for me when I was already going through so much.” She scowled towards the window. “And seeing how Lucien just blurted it out to you, I’d say I much prefer how Rhys handled it.”

Elain smiled and stroked her sister’s hand. “I think he regrets it. There’s so much guilt in his eyes when he looks at me.”

“Good.” Feyre lifted her chin. “He should feel guilty.” But her bravado quickly faded, and she did not meet Elain’s gaze.

“The guilt,” Elain murmured, “it’s not just about what happened with me, is it?”

“It’s not my story to tell,” Feyre replied softly.

“I know.” Elain patted Feyre’s hand and asked, her voice stronger, “But how does the bond _work_? Lucien seemed just as surprised about it as everyone else, so I don’t think it was something he chose. Was it?”

“No,” Feyre confirmed. “The male doesn’t make it happen, it just… snaps into place all of a sudden. But only for him. If he hadn’t said anything, you might have never known. And it’s always going to affect him more, always going to have a stronger influence on him than it will on you, unless you decide to accept it. 

Elain frowned. “That doesn’t seem very fair.”

“It’s not,” Feyre agreed, but her voice was not gentle. “But it will be his burden to bear. And if he respects you, then he will accept that.”

To accept a lifetime of the most painful sort of unrequited love… Elain didn’t want to think about the sadness that would entail, the sorrow that she might very well have to inflict on Lucien. “How did you know you wanted to accept the bond?”

Feyre’s face instantly brightened. “When Rhys told me his story. When he told me everything he had endured, and everything he was willing to endure for my sake. And… well, I think I knew even before then, long before I could admit it to myself. I knew him by then. I knew the sort of male he was, and I knew…” The smile that spread over Feyre’s face could have melted a field of ice. “I knew I loved him. I would love him even without the mating bond, but with it… we’re tied together, Rhys and I. He is a part of me, a piece of my soul that I never knew had been missing before.”

Elain rested her head against the back of the couch and sighed. “It sounds beautiful.”

Feyre seemed to have drifted away in her own thoughts, but Elain’s words brought her back, turned her eyes to steel once more. “But the bond isn’t always like that. Fate chose you for each other, but sometimes it chooses poorly. Rhys’s parents were mates, and they were all wrong for each other.”

“But Rhys came from that bond,” Elain pointed out.

“Yes, and sometimes that’s all the bond really does--sometimes it’s just fate making a good guess at how to build a stronger generation. But I don’t want my sister to be reduced to the Cauldron’s idea of good breeding stock!”

The ferocity in her voice made Elain flinch. “I don’t think that’s how Lucien sees me,” she muttered.

Feyre shook her head as if to clear it. “No, I know; I know he doesn’t. Lucien… there’s a darkness to him. You’ve seen that already. He’s flawed, like all of us, and he’s made plenty of mistakes; but he has a good heart underneath it all, and I think--I know he cares about you. But he hardly knows you, and you hardly know him, and I don’t want to see you both rushing into something that might be wrong for you.”

“I know, Feyre. And I’m so grateful to you for looking out for me, like you always have.” Elain looked down at the flower carving in her lap, and she remembered the field of tulips in the light of dawn, and the broken male who had wanted to show her beauty in the darkness. “But… I’d like to know what this bond means for me. What it means for both of us. And if nothing else, I want to get to know him.”

Feyre’s face softened to a weary smile. “Well, I suppose that’s a good place to start.”

Elain kissed her on the cheek and stood. When she reached the doorway, Feyre spoke again. “Don’t think of the mating bond as any sort of… betrothal or obligation that you need to endure.” Elain tilted her head expectantly, and her sister shrugged. “Just think of it as… nature making a suggestion.”

Elain tapped on the wooden doorway thoughtfully, and she returned her sister’s smile with a satisfied nod.

-

Elain was up with the sun the next morning. As she walked downstairs, she was surprised to feel Lucien’s presence already waiting in the dining room. He gave her a sleepy smile over a steaming mug of tea as she entered.

“Good morning,” he said. His hair was pulled back in a low ponytail, but some shorter strands hung loose about his face, framing his sharp cheekbones. His long nose had a slight hook at the end, and his skin was a sun-kissed brown. _Warm._ If she could only pick one word to describe his appearance, it would be “warm.”

As she watched him-- _staring_ , she realized with a jolt in her stomach--he tilted his head downward and brought a hand up to scratch his eyebrow, effectively covering the scarred half of his face. Elain’s heart clenched.

“I wasn’t--” she cried out, but she couldn’t say the words, that she had not been gaping at his scar. She couldn’t bring herself to say the real reason she was staring. It was the same reason she’d had a difficult time looking away when she’d first glimpsed him in Hybern.

He gave her a strained smile. “It’s all right. It’s not my best feature.”

She gripped the chair in front of her. “Do people often stare?”

“Not as much as you’d think. Propriety, I suppose.”

There was more she wanted to ask him, more she wanted to learn, but it was far too early in the day to be talking about scars. So Elain let out a long breath, releasing the tension in her shoulders, and she sat down in the seat directly across from him. “I thought _I_ was an early riser. Have you been up long?”

He seemed to relax, too--enough at least to lower his hand and reveal the rest of his face again. “Not long. I suppose I’ve always been a morning person. Besides…” A wry smile twisted his lips. “My room is across from Rhys and Feyre’s. I try to leave the area before they wake up.”

Her eyes widened when she realized what he was implying. But when she saw the way his lips pursed, how his shoulders shook, she couldn’t help it. She burst out laughing at almost the same time he did.

“Are they that bad?” she asked before another giggle overtook her.

“Sometimes they’re considerate enough to throw up a barrier to block out the noise.” He pinched the bridge of his nose. “And sometimes they forget. Luckily I’m usually up before they are, so it’s easy to escape with my ears unscathed.”

Elain wiped a tear from her eye. “Well, it’s a good thing you’re already a morning person.” She found herself staring at his long, slender hand as it wrapped around the handle of the teapot, pouring tea into her own mug. Not wanting to be caught gaping again, she pulled her gaze away from those graceful fingers and focused instead on the food that had been laid out. She dropped some fruit onto her plate, and with a small smile she said, “You know, I think that’s the first time I’ve heard you laugh.”

His eyebrows shot up. “Really?” When she nodded, he let out a little huff through his nose. “I didn’t realize I’d become so grim recently.”

“The days themselves have been rather grim.” Elain lifted her mug and let the strong scent of the tea fill her nose: cinnamon, ginger, and a wealth of other spices she couldn’t name. The smell invigorated her as she met Lucien’s gaze. “But at least that’s all over with now.”

He smiled and took another sip from his cup. “Thank the gods for that.” He glanced up at her through his red lashes, and his smile turned mischievous. “Although I do hope this little gardening task of yours is enough to keep me occupied. I do hate being bored.”

“Oh? Have you not heard that saying about boredom being the result of a lazy mind?”

Lucien’s eyebrows lifted, and his smile widened to a grin. “I’ve been called many horrible things in my life, but I think ‘lazy’ is a new one.”

Even as she laughed, she wondered at the words that had come out of her mouth. It was hardly the sort of quip she would have made to a stranger in polite company. But then, she supposed at last, he wasn’t quite a stranger anymore. They shared a roof, at least for now; they shared a common affection for Feyre; and they were both very far from the only homes they had ever known.

“What does today’s gardening venture entail?” he asked.

She shifted in her seat as she began to carefully cut open a grapefruit. “Well, I have to look at the space first. Feyre only said that parts of it had been damaged, but she didn’t say how big of an area. Rhys said there was a gardening shop across the river. I thought we might visit the garden first, see what all needs to be done, and then go to the shop.” She glanced up from her plate and found him gazing at her with his face propped up on one hand, a soft smile spread across his lips. “I promise I won’t make you carry anything too heavy.”

He shrugged. “I daresay I’d be better with the heavy lifting than the gardening portion.”

With a glance over her shoulder, the mirth on Lucien’s face vanished, replaced with a sort of dread that could only mean one thing. Elain lifted the mug to her mouth to hide her smile. “Good morning, Nesta,” she said.

Her sister made no sound as she sat down beside Elain. Nesta’s narrowed eyes darted between Elain and Lucien before she replied, her voice utterly neutral, “Good morning.” Lucien muttered a greeting before turning his attention to his plate.

Elain took a long moment to survey her sister, specifically the black leather armor she wore. Her knees bounced as she said, “You’re really going to start training? With Cassian?”

Nesta let out a sharp breath through her nostrils. “Yes.” She quickly added, “Unless you need me to stay here with you. I can always cancel.”

“Oh no, I’ll be fine! I already have plans for today.” She spared a glance at Lucien, who stared determinately out the window, somehow looking very much like a rabbit trying its best to stay still. “Lucien has agreed to help me with some gardening in the city.”

Nesta went perfectly still, save for her eyes, which darted swiftly between the two of them until she declared at last, “I’m cancelling.”

“Don’t you dare!” Elain shot back. “Cassian’s been trying to get you to train with him for months now. Besides, I don’t need a chaperone.”

“ _You_ don’t,” Nesta replied with a dark glare at Lucien.

Lucien opened his mouth as if to defend himself, but he was interrupted by a voice from the doorway, forcing its way through a fierce yawn. “Honestly, Nesta, what do you think is going to happen?”

Feyre dropped herself into the seat at the head of the table, her back to the window. As she piled her plate high with breakfast pastries, she continued, “It’s broad daylight in a city where her sister is High Lady. Even Lucien couldn’t get away with any mischief.” She threw a smirk at him as she took a bite from a pastry.

Elain smoothed out the wrinkles in her skirt and mumbled, “I think Nesta’s just afraid to spend time alone with Cassian.”

Everyone else in the room choked on their food.

-

Out in the sunlit streets of Velaris and safely out of earshot of the townhouse, Lucien tilted his head back and grinned at the sky. “Oh, I will treasure that look on your sister’s face for as long as I live.”

Elain ducked her head and giggled. “Maybe it wasn’t the most tactful way of putting it, but I don’t think I was wrong.” As he smiled at her with a sidelong glance, she shrugged. “I might be the only person who can get away with teasing Nesta like that. She finds it difficult to be mad at me.”

He held her gaze for a moment, and a shadow seemed to pass over his face when he finally looked away. “It’s not a bad thing, you know,” he said softly. “Having overprotective sisters."

She remembered the brief words they had exchanged yesterday and the scant information she’d gotten from Feyre about his brothers. “How many brothers do you have?”

He took a few seconds to respond. “Six.”

“How many are older than you?”

“All of them.”

Six older brothers, and if what he’d said yesterday was true, he did not think highly of any of them. Elain felt like a weight had been dropped into her stomach; but his face revealed nothing. “And none of them… were the protective sort? Like Nesta and Feyre are for me?”

He gazed down at the cobblestone path. Elain focused on his russet eye, but it revealed nothing as he replied, “Ours is not that sort of family.”

His face was so utterly neutral, so devoid of any expression, as if he’d erected a wall between his face and his true thoughts. Elain was wondering if she should not have pressed the matter when he rolled his shoulders and asked, “So where is this garden of yours?”

She consulted the paper that Feyre had given her, featuring a map from the townhouse to the garden, as well as the location of a garden shop on the other side of the river. “According to Feyre’s directions…” She stopped in the middle of the street and turned to their left, facing what seemed to be north. “There’s a street two blocks down that leads straight to the river. The garden will be on that street right before the bridge.” She held the makeshift map closer to her face and squinted. “Although I’m not sure how far away it will be.”

“Well, I don’t know about you,” said Lucien, “but I have nowhere else to be today.” He gestured north and gave a slight bow. “Lead the way.”

She curtseyed and laughed, and they began walking down the side street that would lead to the main road towards the river. The sun warmed them against the encroaching autumn chill as it crept over the colorful brick buildings of Velaris. She had lost track of the days spent in that mountain palace above the city, where Rhys had brought her and Nesta following the disaster in Hybern. Later she’d learn that the summer solstice had come and gone while she was lost in the fog of her own mind. Though the autumnal equinox was now approaching, the weather in Velaris remained mild. She imagined colder days were approaching far more quickly in the human lands.

Lucien remained quiet as they walked, that shadow still cast over his handsome face. She cleared her throat and asked, “Was the weather always like this in the Autumn Court?”

Her words seemed to snap him out of his reverie. He gave his head a small shake before responding, “Not always. Today would be warm by Autumn’s standards. There would be days like this, and then you’d get cloudy days with biting winds. You might wake up to frost around winter solstice.”

She wanted to know more--she still had so much to learn about Prythian and its lands; but she saw the way his jaw clenched, the shadow creeping over his face again, and she did not want to make him linger in whatever darkness he’d left behind in Autumn. “What about the Spring Court? What was it like there?”

He raised an eyebrow. “Feyre never told you about it?”

She shrugged. In truth, she’d never asked her sister. It seemed every time that court was brought up, her face became covered in that same sort of shadow that haunted Lucien when he spoke of his original home. “She never seemed to want to talk about it.”

Lucien snorted. “I suppose that’s understandable.” He considered for a moment. “Spring is… well, it’s exactly what you’d expect. Beautiful weather, beautiful gardens and forests, comfortable in every way.”

She almost laughed at his casual, dismissive tone. “You make beauty sound boring.”

“Don’t get me wrong,” he replied quickly, “I was happy to be there. After everything that… after coming from the Autumn Court, it was nice to live somewhere peaceful. But, well.” He smirked at her. “With my lazy mind and all, I suppose I get bored easily.”

She ducked her head and giggled. “Well, I hope you find enough things to occupy your time here.”

“I thought I’d start with learning how to garden.” His smirk softened to a real smile, that shadow seemingly chased away for now.

As he turned that smile on her, Elain felt something flutter deep in her stomach. She wondered if it was a result of the mating bond, giving her such wild butterflies when he smiled at her, or if it was nothing more than the fact that he was, like most High Fae she’d seen, exceedingly attractive.

_Nature making a suggestion_ , Feyre had said. Elain only wished that nature was not so insistent about it. She realized that she wasn’t breathing, and she forced herself to exhale as she tore her gaze from his.

They continued on in silence, and unfortunately for Elain, that made all the other sounds of the city seem louder. She’d gotten a little better these past few weeks at tuning out all the random noises her fae ears brought her, but it was somehow so much harder when no one was talking. It was one of the reasons she enjoyed her time with Azriel, or with Nuala and Cerridwen. Even those quiet conversations helped her to drown out the incessant din of insects and footsteps and seagulls, even the sound of leaves brushing together in a breeze, the sound of the wind itself. The dull roar of it all now made her want to cover her ears. But there were so many people walking by, and she was sure that Lucien did not want to be walking next to some cowering girl who couldn’t handle what was, to everyone but her, completely normal sounds.

Her discomfort must have been apparent on her face, because Lucien asked in a low voice, “Are you all right?”

She cringed, rubbing the base of her palm against her ear. “The noises are all a bit… overwhelming. Nesta seems to have gotten used to it, but...” Her cheeks burned suddenly.

But he only nodded, and his voice was gentle. “We adjust to it as children. Some healers think that our senses gradually ramp up as we grow, so as not to overwhelm us when we’re babes.” She caught him glancing at her out of the corner of her eye. “But the crickets were the worst for me.” She stared up at him questioningly, and he continued, “When I was young, I had no problem blocking out everything else when I wanted to, but for some reason, crickets always drove me mad. I felt like I could hear them from every part of the house. I didn’t tell anyone about it. I’m sure if they’d known, my brothers would have released an army of crickets into my room. But my mother figured it out.” A slow smile spread over his face, and the sorrow in it made Elain’s heart clench. “If they were ever particularly noisy, she would come to my room, tell me to focus only on her voice, and she would sing to me until I fell asleep.”

His mother… Elain had heard so little about his family, but Feyre had once told her that Lucien’s mother had saved her once, during that horrible time she and Rhys had been imprisoned. It seemed that Lucien remembered her much more fondly than he did his brothers.

He met her gaze and asked, “Have you tried doing that? Picking one sound to focus on to drown out all the others?” When she shook her head, he looked about the crowded street before pointing to a nearby tree that had a very vocal mockingbird bouncing among its branches. “That bird, maybe. Use that as your focal point and let everything else become background noise.”

Elain certainly could hear the bird, but its song was varied, inconsistent. She wanted something steadier--like the solid drumming beside her, nestled in Lucien’s chest. She closed her eyes and focused on his heartbeat, let it fill her ears, her mind, until it was the only sound that mattered. The other sounds faded away--still present, but distant and unimportant. 

When she opened her eyes, she made herself keep that focus, that steady drum to drown out the chatter of the rest of the world. And when she met Lucien’s gaze again, she grinned from ear to ear.

“It worked!” she exclaimed breathlessly.

He returned her grin with his own, bright as the sun. “I’m glad.”

They continued to grin at each other, until Elain realized those butterflies had returned in full force, and she looked away with a nervous giggle. Lucien cleared his throat and faced down the road again. They only got a few more steps before he nodded ahead. “Is that our garden?”

Indeed, a few yards ahead, on the left side of the road just before a wide bridge over the river, there was a fenced-off area full of greenery. The park was narrow but stretched far back, away from the street and along the riverwalk. A cobblestone pathway weaved its way through the grass, and at the center of the park, the pathway circled a small fountain made of stone and green bronze. There were small trees and flowering bushes throughout, and benches of wood and iron dotted the perimeter. As they approached the archway leading into the park, Elain saw that a section of the wrought-iron fence at the entrance looked newer and freshly painted. Just behind that newer section of fencing, in the corner of the park closest to the bridge, were patches of burnt grass and bare soil. The ground had divots and small craters, as if something--or several somethings--had crashed and thrashed here not long ago. Elain shuddered.

“It does look rather sad compared to the rest of the place, doesn’t it?” she said as they surveyed the area.

Lucien nodded, prodding a rather large dip in the soil with his toe. “Any ideas on how to fix it?”

She frowned at the scene and paced for a moment, tapping her chin in thought. She pointed at the space by the fence that faced the street. “Maybe something tall there. Flowers would be nicest, of course, but with it getting colder soon…” She lifted her head suddenly and whirled around to face him. “What sort of flowers grow in the Autumn Court?”

He blinked, clearly unprepared for such a question. But as he gazed down at the space she had indicated, a familiar soft sorrow passed over his face. “Sunflowers. My mother had a garden of them outside her bedroom window.” He shook his head and shrugged roughly, as if freeing himself from a memory. “But I’m afraid I don’t know many other flowers by name.”

Elain’s eyes widened, and she grinned. “Sunflowers! Those would look perfect!” She surveyed the area for another minute or two, cataloguing in her mind the amount of space they had to work with, and then she nodded to herself. “Come on, that garden shop should be just on the other side of the bridge. Maybe you’ll be able to pick out some other autumn flowers!”

There was no hesitation in her heart as she held out her elbow to him.

Lucien stared at her elbow with wide eyes, and she found herself focusing again on his heartbeat, quicker now than it had been before. Slowly, a smile spread over his face, and just as slowly, he looped his arm through hers.

_Warm_ , she found herself thinking again.

It was not a far walk to the little gardening shop, over the bridge and down a little side street. It was effectively a greenhouse, glass walls supported by narrow wooden beams. The shopkeeper somehow recognized Elain, which made her wonder if Feyre had at some point notified him to keep an eye out for her. They did indeed have sunflowers, and Lucien was able to recognize other plants from his home court: soft yellow tufts of goldenrod, delicate stalks of purple heather, and round chrysanthemums in a rainbow of colors.

Despite Elain’s horrified protests, the shopkeeper would not allow her to pay, insisting that the High Lady had already taken care of Elain’s expenses. He even had one of his assistants help them carry the flowers--as well as a shovel and two spades--back to the park. The assistant, a male who looked young even by human standards, gave Elain an awkward bow and an even more awkward wave before he turned to leave. His whole face turned red as she thanked him profusely for the help.

As the boy scurried away, Lucien gave Elain a teasing smirk. “It seems your reputation precedes you, Lady Archeron. Even the shopkeepers and their assistants know your name.”

She folded her arms over her chest and glared at him beneath her eyebrows, utterly failing to hide her smile. “Just more of Feyre taking care of me. I wonder if she’ll ever stop.”

“Doubtful. I think that’s just part of who she is.” Lucien picked up the shovel and stabbed it into the barren soil by the fence. “Shall I start digging here?” He braced one foot against the exposed top of the shovel blade and began to roll his sleeves up to his elbows. Elain’s gaze trailed down to the bare brown skin of his forearms, watching as the muscles and tendons flexed with each movement of his fingers.

Elain turned away so quickly she almost lost her balance. She nearly fell again trying to carry one of the potted sunflowers over to where Lucien stood. He intercepted her before she could make it far and took the pot from her hands.

“Yes,” she said, and immediately she cringed at how out of breath she sounded. “Right there in front of the fence. The hole should be a bit wider and a bit deeper than this pot.”

If he noticed how flustered she’d become, he mercifully did not react to it. After he’d dug a suitable hole, Elain showed him how to carefully remove the flower from its temporary pot and replant it in the ground. It was truthfully a relief to have someone more physically capable than her around to dig and manage the rather tall sunflowers, even if she found it difficult to tear her gaze away from those inexplicably mesmerizing forearms of his.

Before long, they had all of the sunflowers safely in the ground, creating a picturesque, sunny backdrop for their little corner of the park. Elain let out a contented sigh as they stood back to observe their work.

“Perfect,” she said, giving Lucien a sidelong smile. “We’ll make a gardener of you yet, Lucien.”

He returned her smile, and Elain heard his heartbeat quicken again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry this took so long! I really should've waited until after the holidays to post a multi-chapter fic, hah. I probably could've made this chapter longer, but I felt like this was a good stopping point. Now that the season of familial obligations is over, I should have more time for writing.
> 
> Thank you for reading!! ♥


	4. Chapter 4

Lucien was sure that his heart was about to burst from his chest. He, with the logic and cold reasoning that he’d cultivated over centuries, was rendered dumbstruck by a mere smile. Every slight movement she made, every flutter of her long lashes, even the pulse of blood through a vein in her slender neck, made his instincts roar at him: _Mate. Mine. Touch, claim, protect. Give her everything. Mine. My mate._

He snatched up the shovel and turned away from her, sending a string of creative curses through his mind to drown out those base desires. When had he become such an animal?

“What next?” he asked, his voice rougher than he would’ve liked.

Much to his horror, she came up beside him, close enough that he’d barely have to move to touch her. She hummed as she surveyed the uneven ground. He wondered if she had any idea the effect her presence had on him. Merely putting his arm through hers as they’d walked to the flower shop had felt like he’d been struck by lightning. 

“Maybe we can alternate the heather and goldenrod against this other fence.” She dug her foot into the ground where she’d indicated and dragged it in a long line across, hopping on the other foot as she went. Lucien chuckled at the sight.

Mother above, she was the sweetest creature he’d ever seen.

Her face flushed, Elain beamed up at him and gestured to the shallow trench she’d created with her foot. “If you would, sir?”

He bent at the waist and held out an arm in a sweeping bow. “Gladly, my lady.”

Lucien dug with the shovel as Elain lined up the purple and yellow flowers in the arrangement she’d decided upon. As he worked, Lucien found his gaze drifting to the sunflowers standing tall and proud nearby, barely swaying in the cool breeze. These plants nearly reached his chest, but the ones in his mother’s garden had stood even higher. He hadn’t mentioned to Elain that his mother’s sunflower garden was long gone now. Beron had burned the flowers to ash when Lucien was still a child, for no better reason than something had pissed him off.

Elain’s voice dragged him away from the dark place his mind was drifting towards. “Do you get to visit her often? Your mother.”

He stared down at the nearly black soil he’d uncovered. His magical eye spotted all the worms and insects burrowing deeper into the earth to escape the havoc his shovel had wrought. “I saw her Under the Mountain. But I didn’t get to speak with her. If she’d been caught talking to me...” He slammed the shovel into the soil with greater force than was likely necessary. “It would have only caused problems for her.”

Elain knelt on the ground beside his feet, a safe distance away from where he stabbed at the earth as if he could see his father’s face in it. Her fingers stirred the loosened soil as she murmured, “Your mother isn’t like the rest of your family, is she?”

His response was little more than a grunt: “No.”

He was panting now, having exerted far more effort into the digging than he should have needed. He stuck the shovel into the ground and leaned against it. “I told you my brothers weren’t the protective sort. But she was. She protected me whenever she could.” Even when she should have been protecting herself.

Horror wrenched Elain’s beautiful features as she looked up at him. “Protected you from what?”

Tossing the shovel aside, Lucien joined her on the ground. He grabbed the first yellow plant and began to loosen it from its pot. “My father had a game he liked to play--where if he saw me with an injury, he’d ask me who was responsible. The first time it happened, naive little me thought he was going to reprimand the brother who’d given me that black eye. Instead, my father praised him. And my brothers were all very eager for his praise.

“They’re all much older than I am. Back then, they were all bigger and stronger and more experienced with magic. Fighting back only made them laugh.”

His lips twisted into a smirk. “I played my own games, though. Eventually, when he’d ask me who was responsible, I’d give him the wrong name. It usually ended with them fighting amongst each other.”

He spared a glance at Elain and found her looking at him with wide eyes and trembling lips. She shook her head slowly and whispered, “Your own father-- your own brothers did that to you? And you were only a _child_.” Her voice broke at the last word as tears slipped from her eyes.

_Shit_. Everything had been going so well. They’d been having such a nice, normal day, and now he’d made her cry. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to upset you.”

She clenched her fists into her skirt and said sharply, “ _You’re_ not the one who should be sorry!” She snatched the pot out of his hands with surprising ferocity and yanked the plant out by the base of its stem.

Lucien quirked an eyebrow. “Well, don’t punish the flower. It didn’t do anything wrong.”

Elain’s red-rimmed eyes bore into him, tearing into his very soul. With each drum of his heartbeat, his instincts roared at him: _Mate. Protect. Comfort._ At last she turned away from him and blew out a shaky breath. Far more gently than her previous movements, she set the packed dirt covering the flower’s roots into the ground.

“It’ll be fine,” she muttered. “It’s not as frail as it looks.”

He helped her shove loose soil into the gaps around the plant’s roots. His fingers deftly avoided touching hers. “I forget, sometimes,” he began in a soft voice, “that you weren’t raised in our world. That you’re not accustomed to its particular brand of brutality.” He dared to look at her face and found it still haunted by the truths he’d laid before her. He didn’t want to think about how she would look at him when she learned the real horrors of his past. “You never would have chosen to become fae, would you?” he whispered, more a statement than a question.

She brushed her slender fingers against the soft yellow tufts of the flower. “If you’d asked me that before… when I was still human… I would have said no. And I would have said no even a month ago. But my sisters are here. And with how everything turned out--” She interrupted herself with a shuddering breath, and through the bond Lucien saw-- _felt_ a memory of a blade slicing through flesh, and he knew that she was recalling the moment on a distant battlefield when the axis of an entire war had shifted, all because of her. “I have to think that it happened for a reason. That this is where I was supposed to end up all along.”

Everything down to the very marrow of his bones screamed at him to embrace her then, to give her some sort of comfort. But he would not initiate any touch. He had not earned it yet, maybe never would. “I only wish you could have chosen it for yourself, instead of having it forced on you.”

Elain’s eyes widened as she met his gaze, and he knew at once that she understood the other meaning behind his words. He watched her swallow, watched the sadness pass over her face as she replied, “Me too.”

Lucien couldn’t bear to look at the sorrow in her eyes anymore. He reached behind them to grab another potted flower, a small bush of straight-stalked purple flowers. “You said this was called heather?” When she nodded, he sniffed the blooms and gave them a skeptical frown. “It looks like lavender.”

She laughed, and the sound took his breath away. “They smell completely different!”

He raised an eyebrow at her, forcing his features into a cynical expression. “But they do _look_ the same.”

She rolled her eyes. “Have you ever even seen a lavender plant? The flowers don’t look anything like this.”

“I suppose I have to take your word for it.”

Giggling, she took the plant from him, rested it in her lap, and proceeded to give him an in-depth explanation on the differences between lavender and heather. When she’d finished, Lucien shrugged and let out an exaggerated sigh. “If you say so, I will concede that they are different.”

“I _do_ say so.” She put her hands on her hips and lifted her chin. “Now please put this in the ground.”

He took the plant back and mumbled, “Slave driver.” But he was smiling, and so was she, and soon they were both laughing.

-

They ate lunch in the city, at a small cafe a few blocks from the park. Much to Lucien’s chagrin, the cafe owner wasn’t going to allow him to pay for the meal. She’d taken one look at Elain and declared their entire meal on the house.

“It’s not so bad, is it?” Elain said as she noticed his annoyance. “Didn’t you want to save up money to buy your own house here?”

The little smile she gave him melted away any ill feelings. Maybe someday he could properly treat her, spoil her as she deserved; but she was there before him, smiling at him. No, it was not so bad. “A house might be optimistic for me. I really have no idea how much that would cost in this city.” He cringed slightly as he scratched the back of his head, loosening his hair further from where he’d bound it that morning. “I suppose I’m pretty sheltered in that regard.”

Elain picked at the frayed edge of her menu. “You’re not the only one. It was a rather rude awakening for us when we saw… when we realized what it was like to live with nothing.”

_A hovel_. That was how Tamlin had described the place where he’d found Feyre. Little more than a two-room shack. “I wouldn’t call you sheltered now. You know what it’s like to live in poverty, you suffered through it for years.”

She winced. “I’m not the one who suffered. I was just another mouth for Feyre to feed.”

He knew a few details of how they had lived those years before Tamlin burst through her door. Feyre had been their sole source of food and income. “I don’t think she holds it against you.”

“It’s easy to forgive when we’re not living through it anymore. When she’s not out there in those cold woods.”

Lucien smiled at her even as he remembered what Feyre had done so long ago, the price that had been paid for their salvation, and the friend who had not lived to see Prythian freed. “If she hadn’t been out there in those cold woods, I’d still be imprisoned under a mountain.” He snorted. “Wearing that damned mask.”

She returned his smile tentatively, even a bit mischievously. “Feyre said it was a fox mask.”

“I’ve been told it was very appropriate.”

As they waited for their food to arrive, sipping on the water they desperately needed after the morning’s exertions, Lucien let his eyes rove through the street. Elain had picked a table on the cafe’s patio, and Lucien was more than happy to remain outdoors. With the sun fully overhead, the air had grown warmer, though nowhere near the stifling heat he’d experienced on the continent over the summer.

There was the sound of laughter, and then a band of children ran past. Lucien turned to watch as they raced down the street, weaving through the crowds. There were five of them, and they were only the most recent of the dozens of children he’d seen in the streets today. He’d not seen so many young faeries in… well, he honestly couldn’t remember.

He slowly turned away, back towards Elain. “I still can’t believe that this place exists. That it’s been hidden up here all this time. In the Night Court, of all places.”

She tilted her head and hunched her shoulders in a quizzical stance. “The Night Court isn’t what you expected?”

“Not in the slightest. I expected it to be like--” _Like Under the Mountain._

“Like what?” she prompted.

Lucien’s throat had gone dry. He look a long drink of water before he answered, “Best not to talk about it. I’ve already made you cry once today.”

Her shoulders slumped, and she tucked a strand of golden-brown hair behind her ear. Dirt still clung to her fingers. “I hear similar things from Feyre all the time. There are things she still won’t talk about.” She propped her chin up on her hand as she gazed out over the river. “I wonder if I’ll ever hear the whole truth about her time away from us.”

Lucien watched as the wind tugged on her stray curls. He burned the image into his mind, every lash, every freckle committed to memory. In case that day ever came when she finally sent him away--or when he could bear it no longer and had to flee from her himself. “There were things Feyre endured as a human that would have left most fae broken. Maybe… maybe they broke her, too, and she somehow pulled herself back together.”

Elain smiled into the gentle breeze. “I think Rhys helped a bit with that.”

He snorted, but his voice was not harsh--he couldn’t bring himself to criticize Rhys, not after everything he’d learned. “Don’t give him too much credit. There was plenty that Feyre took care of all on her own.”

“She had to,” said Elain, her smile vanishing. “She learned how to take care of herself a long time ago. Because no one else was going to.”

He felt it on the other end of the mating bond: the shame and overwhelming guilt. Such guilt, and she had not even failed Feyre half as much as Lucien had.

“Don’t,” he said softly. When her eyes darted towards him, he continued in a voice barely above a whisper, “Don’t do that to yourself.”

She placed both of her hands flat on the table and stared down at them. “It’s the truth, isn’t it? She should have let us starve to make us realize just how useless we were, but she still convinced Tamlin to give us our fortune back.”

He wasn’t sure if he was doing more harm than good, but he at least felt she should know the truth. “She didn’t know that Tamlin was taking care of you. That’s why she spent so much time trying to convince both of us to let her return to you.”

Elain looked up at him with raised brows. “He did all of that on his own?”

“Tamlin isn’t--” Lucien choked on the words, wincing. “-- _wasn’t_ all that bad. But he’s always been a bit of a brute, always been a bit too wound up. And…” The thought that would have once been an awful betrayal became nothing more than a sad truth. “He’s a terrible High Lord.”

Saying it aloud was like the weakening of a dam. “He’s never had the finesse for it. If he couldn’t solve a problem with his claws, then he didn’t want to deal with it. He’d ignore it. Lock it away.” He swallowed hard. “Like he did with Feyre.”

As Elain’s gaze pierced him with an expression he couldn’t read, his thoughts drifted back to that horrendous day. Tamlin had executed the first two guards before Lucien could even get a single word out and had moved on to the others with brutal swiftness, heedless of his emissary’s pleas. When it had become clear that Tamlin could not, would not hear him, Lucien had hurried towards where the servant fae, Alis, waited in the shadows. He’d grabbed her by the arm and dragged her down some abandoned corridor, as Tamlin’s roar shook the foundations of the manor.

_“Was it Rhys?” he asked in a breathless rush, as quietly as he could manage._

_Alis’s face was pale and drawn, but she did not quaver from his questioning glare. “It was the Morrigan. She came alone.”_

_As Lucien struggled to place his thoughts somewhere between relief that Rhys had not blatantly declared war and fear at what Tamlin would do regardless, Alis spoke again: “Even if I could have stopped her, I would not have. I begged her to take Feyre away. Because I could not bear to watch this anymore.”_

_Lucien looked at her sharply, read the accusation in her confession. She might as well have slapped him across the face with the words she had not said aloud:_ I could not bear to watch Feyre fall apart anymore. But you could, Lucien. You _did._

_He spoke between clenched teeth, each word deliberate: “You did no such thing. You were too afraid to approach. You watched from a distance and begged her to stop. Do you understand?”_

_Alis only nodded._

A soft hand touched his, dragging him back to the present, back to the warm brown eyes that stared beseechingly at him.

“Don’t do that to yourself,” Elain whispered.

He sucked in a sharp breath at her words, at the intensity of the gaze she fixed upon him. He let out a nervous laugh. “Not to brag, but it’s rare for someone to make me eat my own words like that.”

She shrugged. A little smile tugged at her lips. “If it’s a good enough suggestion for me, then it should be good enough for you, too.”

-

They spent the rest of their lunch talking of much more lighthearted subjects. Lucien had told her about what he’d seen in the other courts of Prythian, and Elain had talked more of her childhood. She’d even brought up Nesta’s apparent fear of spiders, knowledge which Lucien gleefully filed away in the back of his mind _just in case_.

When they returned to the townhouse a few hours later, Feyre wandered out of the sitting room to greet them.

“How did it go?” Her question seemed directed at Elain, but she gave Lucien a brief, sidelong glance.

Elain clasped her hands in front of her, grinning. “It was lovely! We found just the right flowers to fill in the gaps. The people at that garden shop were so helpful. And…” She sent a shy smile at Lucien. “Lucien turned out to be very handy with a shovel.”

Feyre raised her brows and grinned. “We’ll have to add that to his list of skills.”

He stuffed his hands into his pockets and shrugged. “I like to think that I have a promising future as a gardener.”

Elain ducked her head and giggled. “Well, I could really use a bath. I’ll see you both at dinner.”

As she disappeared upstairs, Lucien considered his own dirt-crusted hands and decided that he, too, was in desperate need of a bath. He was about to nod his goodbye to Feyre when she took a step forward.

“If you’re not too tired,” she said, “I could use your help as well.”

He raised an eyebrow. “With what?”

“Training.”

Frowning, he replied, “Wouldn’t you rather train with Rhys or Cassian?” He knew for certain that Rhys could run circles around Lucien when it came to swordfighting, and from what he’d seen of Cassian, the Illyrian male was just as skilled.

“Not that sort of training.” Feyre folded her arms over her chest. “I want to master the fire.”

Lucien blinked in surprise. “Ah.”

“The other elements are easier to work with. There’s not as much… collateral damage if I lose control.”

“Right, well.” He pointed upwards. “Rooftop?”

She gave him a skeptical frown, and he might’ve seen a flash of anxiety across her face. “Shouldn’t we go somewhere more isolated?”

“It’s all stone, isn’t it? Unless you happen to be storing stacks of important papers up there for some reason.” She shot him a scowl that would have likely sent a stranger running for his life. “It’ll be fine. I’ll make sure any mishaps stay contained.”

Feyre didn’t look entirely convinced, but she led him up the stairs towards the roof. As they neared the door, she drawled out, “So… how do _you_ think it went?”

He felt his cheeks grow hot. “She didn’t run away screaming, so, better than I expected.”

“Do you often have that problem with females?”

He yanked open the door to the roof and smirked at her. “It’s because they’re intimidated by my good looks.”

Feyre tilted her head back and roared with laughter.

It could have almost been a conversation lifted from their time at the Spring Court, before everything had gone to hell. But the Feyre who stood on the roof now, braiding her hair over leather shoulderpads, was not the human girl he’d met last year. That Feyre had been wide-eyed and timid and too inquisitive for her own good. This Feyre was a High Lady who embraced her power, who took what she wanted and did not apologize. As terrifying as it was, it suited her.

Lucien tossed his jacket onto a nearby chair and rolled up his sleeves. He gestured towards her. “Well? Show me what you can do.”

Feyre lifted her hands, and flames leapt from each finger like candles.

“And?” Lucien prompted, putting as much boredom into that single word as he could muster.

Sweat already dotted the forehead that now wrinkled as she scowled. “What do you mean, ‘and’? Do you know how long it took me to get this much control over it?”

“Well, if I had to hazard a guess, I’d say…” He made a show of counting on his fingers. “About as long as you’ve been fae?”

“Less than that,” she hissed as the flames spouted a bit higher, “since you wouldn’t help me.”

“Fair enough,” he conceded, shoving past the guilt, the deeper accusation in her words. “If I’d started training you when we first realized you had these powers, maybe you’d now be capable of more than parlor tricks.”

The air around them exploded into a whirlwind of flames. Feyre lifted her chin as she let the flames vanish as quickly as they’d come. She replied with a snarl, “Is that what you’d call a ‘parlor trick’?”

Lucien whistled. “Impressive. You’ll be very helpful when Calanmai rolls around.”

A growl rumbled in her throat. “Don’t mention that idiotic festival to me.”

He wondered if she was recalling the animalistic High Lord who’d left an ugly bite mark on her neck all those months ago. As bad as that memory must have been for Feyre, Lucien still greatly preferred that night to the last Calanmai he’d had to endure. “If it makes you feel any better,” he said, hoping he looked as flippant as he sounded, “I’ve grown none too fond of that festival myself.”

“That’s _exactly_ what I’m talking about!” she snapped. The flames engulfed her entire hands. “I can’t believe he made you… that you let yourself…”

All that anger, on _his_ behalf… as if he deserved it from her, of all people. This wasn’t the direction he’d intended to go to get his point across, but if it got the job done... He willed his face into a hardened mask. “I did what was required of me.”

The conflagration that burst from Feyre could have swept over the surrounding buildings--would have, if Lucien hadn’t been anticipating the outburst. His own flames circled their rooftop, wrapping around Feyre’s and keeping them safely contained, but only barely. It took all his energy to drown out her fire. Such raw power… her fire could rival Eris’s one day, if she learned to master it.

Lucien wiped the sweat from his brows and walked slowly towards where Feyre stood, panting, her flames extinguished. “I wasn’t getting you riled up because it’s amusing to me--although it is, sometimes.” As he stood before her, he summoned a little ball of flame, no bigger than a fist, and rolled it back and forth between his hands. “Do you know why Eris is the heir apparent to Beron’s throne?”

“Because he’s the biggest prick out of all of you?”

Lucien almost laughed. “No. Tamlin killed that one.” The rage in Feyre’s eyes dwindled to a quiet smolder. “Eris is the strongest of all of us, because he knows best how to master his emotions, and that is essential to wielding our power. It’s easy to lose control of the fire, to let your anger and fear command it instead of your brain.” He lifted the roiling ball of flame that he cupped between both hands. He let it expand and contract in time with his own breathing, flaring between a scalding blue and a gentler red. “I find it helps not to think of the fire as purely a weapon or a side effect of rage. Here, hold out your hands.”

Feyre’s eyes widened, but she did as he asked, and he passed the flame to her. It flickered briefly, but she soon steadied it.

“Focus on it. What do you feel?”

Waves of orange and red reflected in her steel blue eyes as she held the fire close to her face. “A humming. A pulse… almost like…” She looked up at him with a small smile blooming on her lips, something like wonder in her eyes. “A heartbeat.”

He nodded and returned her smile. “Fire is just as much an instrument of life as it is of destruction. See if you can make this one bigger-- _without_ being pissed off. Time it with your breaths.”

She sucked in a deep breath.

Lucien threw his head backwards just in time to avoid getting singed by the massive plume of flame bursting from Feyre’s hands.

“ _Shit_ ,” she barked, backing away from him. Her arms stretched out to give herself distance from the fireball around her hands that was nearly the size of her torso. But she took another deep breath, and as she released it, the flames shrank to a more manageable size.

“Keep going,” Lucien said, “make it fit in the palm of your hand.”

As she gritted her teeth, the fire shrinking at a snail’s pace, Lucien walked around to stand behind her. “Keep your thoughts clear. Calm. Remember that fire is not good or bad. It does not have emotion. It’s only a tool for you to wield.”

With another long breath, steadier than her last, the fire dissipated until she could cradle it again in her palms.

Lucien clapped her on the shoulder. “Good. Now do it again.”

Despite the rocky start, Feyre proved herself to be a dutiful student. After only an hour, she was able to create multiple balls of flame in varying sizes.

Lucien handed her a glass of water from the pitcher that Nuala had brought them. Feyre drained it in a few gulps. “Eris used the flames as a sort of rope, when we were escaping Autumn,” she said. “I want to learn how to do that. Manipulate it into shapes.”

“That technique took us years to master,” he replied with a smirk, “so you’ll need at least another hour.”

She shoved him lightly in the shoulder. Her smile softened and became thoughtful. “Did you decide yet?”

He frowned at her. “Decide what?”

“If she’s worth fighting for.”

Lucien stared down at his hands, still covered in dirt from that morning. Elain’s gentle laugh rang through his mind like a lingering song. “She is. Of course she is. And somehow that makes this all so much worse.”

Feyre gripped his arm. “Just give her _time_ , Lucien. Give _yourself_ time.”

“Time isn’t what I’m worried about,” he said sharply. “I’d wait forever, if she asked me to. If I thought there was even the slightest chance...” His voice lowered to a whisper. “It’s not the future that scares me, Feyre.”

Each word Feyre said was fierce and firm. “There is not one thing in your past that would make Elain refuse you. Not one thing that she would look down on you for.”

“And if I failed her too?” Lucien met her gaze, bared his teeth as his heart raced. “If I failed her the way I failed you? The way I failed--”

He clamped his mouth shut and turned away. His voice was thick when he spoke again. “You did well. You’re a faster learner than I ever was. Let me know if you ever want to train again.”

He was through the door and halfway down the stairs when a strong hand grasped the back of his shirt and halted him in his tracks.

Feyre used her considerable strength to whirl him around to face her. He could have sworn he saw starlit shadows flaring behind her as her gaze bore into him. Then she straightened on the stair above him, and she draped his discarded jacket over his shoulder.

“There are many theaters in this city,” she said curtly, lifting her chin. “If you ever want to visit one, we can get you the best seats.” Her lips twisted upwards. “Elain likes romantic musicals. Happy endings only.”

The High Lady of the Night Court swept past Lucien, patting him on the shoulder. “I’ll see you at dinner.”

-

That night, Lucien dreamt of towering bonfires and pounding drums. He dreamt of the hunt.

His chest was naked to the cool spring air that rushed past him as he raced through the woods. He gripped a bow in one hand, arrows clacking together in the quiver at his back. The white stag was like a sliver of moonlight darting through the trees ahead.

Lucien banked to the right as the stag continued straight. The rush of the hunt pounded in his veins. The Hunter incarnate. The stag was his.

He’d gained enough ground on his prey. He threw himself against a tree beside a clearing, directly in the stag’s path. He snatched an arrow from his quiver and fixed it to the bow. Stepping into the clearing, he drew the bowstring back.

A female voice drifted from behind him like a chill wind: “Can you truly do it, Lucien?”

Ianthe’s finger ran down his spine with all the affection of a dagger. “Can you fire that arrow?”

Lucien did not look at her. His eyes scanned the clearing for that flash of white. “The stag is mine.”

The silver of her bracelets chimed together like a dozen tiny bells, as she reached up to grasp his shoulders. Her voice was directly beside his ear now. “How cruel you are, Lucien. You would strike the stag with your arrow? You would lay claim to that poor beast?”

White fur gleamed in the moonlight; long, slender limbs took careful steps into the clearing. Not a stag--a doe. Lucien’s response was a whisper between his teeth. “ _Mine_.”

Ianthe’s laugh rang between the trees, loud and harsh. The doe lifted her head and stared. Their eyes met. The doe did not retreat.

Fire lashed out like a whip around the doe’s neck. She let out a bleating cry as she was yanked to the ground by a rope of pure flame. Another laugh, the deeper echo of Ianthe’s, sounded from across the clearing as Beron stepped out of the shadow of the trees. He held the flaming rope in one hand, and in the other--

Jesminda met his gaze.

Her black hair was held tightly in Beron’s grasp. Tears fell from her brilliant green eyes.

“You cannot save them,” Ianthe hissed into his ear. “They will both perish. For your love--they will both die.”

Lucien pointed the arrow at his father; but as he drew it back, it went limp in the bow--an arrow no longer, but a sunflower. As he lifted it, it blackened and turned to ash in his hands. He looked up again to find his mother across the clearing, standing behind Jesminda, her face a portrait of beauty and sorrow, as it had been for as long as he could remember.

“You could not save us,” his mother said.

Red rose petals drifted before his eyes. He followed them to where Feyre sat crumpled beside the doe, her skeletal frame drowning in the pristine folds of her wedding dress. She did not look at him, only at the doe writhing upon the ground. “You cannot save anyone,” she whispered.

Still Ianthe laughed, wrapping her arms around his bare chest. Her bracelets dug into his skin as she pressed herself against him.

Jesminda’s eyes remained fixed upon him, even as Beron drew the blade cleanly across her neck. Lucien’s knees buckled; he tried to collapse, but Ianthe held him firm against her.

Beron pulled slowly upon the fiery tether, wrapped not around a white doe, but a slender neck. The doe had taken a female form, curled up on the ground, a soaking nightgown clinging to her skin.

Elain. _Elain._

Lucien called to her, reached for her; but no sound escaped his lips, and the priestess did not let go. He watched as Beron’s blade pressed against Elain’s throat.

Elain’s brown eyes settled calmly upon Lucien. “You cannot save me,” she said.

Her blood stained the ground.

The clearing erupted in flame.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I might be veering away from canon a bit here with Feyre's grip on the fire magic (or lack thereof, as I'm presenting it). I can't remember how much of it she's mastered by the end of ACOWAR, but I like the idea of Lucien training her. :)
> 
> Thank you all so, so much for reading and commenting and leaving kudos! I'm so glad people are enjoying my silly little "I need to get this out of my system" fic!!


	5. Chapter 5

Blood. Blood and flame, and a man’s roar of pain and fear and overwhelming loss.

Elain awoke with a gasp.

She bolted upright and found herself in her bedroom, no sign of the fire in the dark woods or the blood-stained grass. But the fear and despair lingered. They pulsed through her in waves, but they did not come _from_ her. It was like hearing a sound through a closed door. The fear barreled down the invisible rope tied to her belly, and she knew at once whose dream she had glimpsed.

Another wave of terror struck her, and before she could take too much time to reconsider, she rolled out of bed, grabbed her robe, and opened the door.

Her too-sharp ears picked up a cacophony in the dark hallway; she could hear Nesta’s even breathing in the room across from hers; insects hummed and buzzed outside; a mouse burrowed in the garden. As she padded down the hallway, she sought the sound that had calmed her in the city that morning, that heartbeat that she seemed to hear above all others.

It fluttered like the wings of a trapped bird.

She stopped in front of Lucien’s door and angled her head to listen inside. His breaths came out in short rasps, and the rustling of linens told her he thrashed about in his bed. She knocked gently on the door and whispered, “Lucien?”

There was no reply. Another surge of anguish struck her through the bond, so hard that she recoiled. She took in a sharp breath through her nose, and that was when she noticed the scent of smoke.

Elain didn’t think twice as she turned the doorknob.

Shutting the door behind her, she rushed towards where Lucien tossed and writhed in the tangled sheets. Tendrils of smoke curled from his clenched fists.

Elain braced her arms on the edge of the bed and leaned over him. “Lucien!”

One of his fists unclenched to reveal fingertips smoldering like embers. His fingers hovered over the bedsheets. Elain’s own hands shot out to stop him, to shake him awake, but she halted right above his shoulders, sweat-slicked and utterly bare. That prim and proper human still lurking inside her shrieked at the breach of decorum. Too much--touching his naked skin, here in his bedroom in the dead of night, wouldn’t that be too much?

Another wave of terror washed over her through the bond, another flash of blood racing from his mind into hers--her blood, she realized, on a dagger held by a cruel-looking fae.

Lucien’s hand clenched--into the sheets. The fire sprung up instantly.

Elain no longer hesitated. She grabbed his shoulders and shook as hard as she could. “ _Lucien_!”

With a strangled cry, his eyes shot open. Elain released him and jumped back to avoid his still-smoking hands. Lucien’s frantic gaze darted throughout the room as Elain hurried to the other side of the bed, where the fire was quickly spreading. She took up a blanket that had fallen to the floor and used it to smother the fire.

Lucien’s chest heaved as he finally settled his wide eyes on her--at least, his organic eye stayed on her. The mechanical one still jerked every which way, as if hunting for the horrors of that nightmare forest.

“I didn’t--” His voice was hoarse. “I didn’t hurt you, did I?”

“No,” she replied. Her heart raced about as fast as his, but she thought she should at least pretend to be calm for his sake. “Though you did scare me half to death when you set your own bed on fire.”

His gaze swept over her, as if to confirm that she was unharmed, before he fell back onto the bed with a groan. As he rubbed his palm into his good eye, he muttered, “I haven’t had a nightmare like that in a very long time. I’m sorry you got dragged into it.” His hands fell to his side. His gold eye looked to her while the other focused on the ceiling, as if he couldn’t seem to meet her gaze fully. “Thank you.” He nearly choked on the words. “For waking me.”

She clasped her hands in front of her. “Do you want to talk about it?”

He slowly sat up again and crossed his legs beneath him; though he was shirtless, he did have pants on, much to Elain’s relief. He rested his forearms on his knees and took a deep breath before he replied, “It was--no. No, I don’t want to burden you with it. You have your own nightmares to deal with; you shouldn’t have to carry mine around, too.”

Elain recalled what little Feyre had revealed about her time in the Spring Court, how Lucien had sought to shield her from the outside world at the behest of his overprotective High Lord. Maybe that was where the heat in her voice came from as she twitched her nose and said, “I saw some of it, you know.”

He finally lifted both eyes to meet hers. His breathing was shallow. “What did you see?”

She tried to play off the shudder that ran through her as a casual roll of her shoulders. “I saw myself. Someone had cut my throat. It was a man--male, with cold, cruel eyes.”

He looked away again. “Beron. My father.”

Elain blinked. “Your _father_?” She’d heard enough about Lucien’s family to know that they were cruel, even abusive; but to imagine his own father doing such a thing… Why had his subconscious dreamed up something so horrible? “I knew your family was bad, but could you really imagine your father doing…” She found her hand reaching for her own throat.

But Lucien did not look at her, and he did not reply.

Elain wrapped her robe more tightly around herself, suddenly cold despite the sweat that had accumulated on the back of her neck. “Well,” she said, her voice almost a mumble, “good night, then.”

Her hand was on the doorknob when she heard him whisper behind her:

“Four.”

If not for her fae hearing, she didn’t think she would have heard that whisper, that one word somehow heavy with sorrow. “What?”

He didn’t meet her gaze as he rubbed some of the ashes on his bed between his fingers. “I lied to you this morning. When you asked me how many brothers I have. I _had_ six brothers once, but now I only have four.”

Slowly she sat down on the edge of the bed. “I’m sorry,” she whispered.

A humorless laugh shuddered out of his chest. “Don’t give me any pity. I’m the reason they’re dead.”

She reached out to touch his trembling hand, but his fingers twitched away from her. Still he refused to meet her gaze, and so she leaned in as close as she dared, until she could see all the intricate lines of his golden eye. “Please. Tell me what happened.”

He ran both hands through his hair, heedless of the ash still clinging to his skin. “I suppose I can’t hide the truth forever.” His hands grasped at his neck as he tilted his head back and let out a long breath. And whatever Elain had expected him to say, it was not this: “Her name was Jesminda.”

With another heavy sigh, his hands fell into his lap. “When I was young, I fell in love. She was beautiful, and joyous, and free, and… so many things that my family was not. But she was a lesser fae--daughter of a poor farmer. She was not the sort of female that a high lord’s son is supposed to marry.”

He clenched his shaking fists. The amber tint of his eye seemed to glow brighter as he glared straight ahead at the shadows in his room. “If I had only passed it off as some fling, some fleeting affair--if I had only let her go, she might still be alive today.”

Dread twisted in Elain’s stomach.

“My father found out. And before we could escape, he captured us both. He had my brothers hold me down. He slit her throat. I watched her die. And I could do nothing to stop it.”

Elain brought a hand up to her mouth to stifle her sob.

“When they released me, I renounced my bloodline, my claim to the throne of Autumn, and I left my father’s court. But renouncing my claim only made me an easier target. Three of my brothers hunted me down, and they ambushed me at the edge of the border with Spring. But Tamlin found me, too. They attacked, and he killed my brother Argus. When they did not back down, I killed Balius myself.

“He was the one closest in age to me. I always thought there was good in him, but, well… he was easily influenced by the others, by our father. I still remember the rage in his eyes when he flew at me, right before I put my sword through him. It’s not rare in the Autumn Court for a High Lord’s sons to turn against each other. I’d tricked myself into thinking that I was above the cruelty of my bloodline--until that day they took Jesminda away, and I realized that I would burn them all if I could.”

His eyes met hers at last, and the hopelessness she found etched into his face made another sob escape her. “I never wanted a mating bond,” he said with heartbreaking clarity. “Not after what happened that day. How could I ask any female to bind herself to me, knowing what I had done? I’m a kinslayer who couldn’t even protect the female I loved. If I live out the rest of my days alone, it’ll be exactly what I deserve.”

She took a steadying breath before she spoke, softly but firmly, “Do you think that’s what she would have wanted for you?”

He blinked in shock, as if recoiling from her words. But the shadow in his eye remained. “I wish I knew what she wanted. But I never will, and it’s my own damned fault.”

“How can you blame yourself for this when it was your awful family who was responsible?” She made to grab his hand, but he again snatched it away. Her despair over the tale he’d just told tore at her heart, made her feel so utterly helpless, and maybe it was because she needed to vent that sorrow, that frustration, needed to _do something_ about it that she snapped, “Oh, would you _please_ stop flinching away from me like I’m some wild animal and just let me comfort you?”

Lucien’s eyes went wide, and horror gripped Elain as she wondered if she had gone too far. But the words were already out of her, and though she was sure her face showed her fear clear as day, she could only go forward. “We’re friends now, aren’t we? Friends are allowed to comfort each other.”

He shook his head--not in denial, but in disbelief. “You’d still want to call me a friend, even after everything you just learned?” His voice became very small. “Why?”

Her lips trembled as the tears fought their way through. “Because you’re not the only one to ever fail someone you love.”

His shoulders seemed to relax a bit as a soft sigh escaped him. He shook his head again, slowly. “Believe me, nothing you’ve done to Feyre can compare to how I failed her.”

An awful laugh, nothing like her normal one, tore from her throat. “You’ve known her for a year. I’ve been failing her for her entire life.”

Lucien leaned forward, newfound ferocity in his voice. “Nothing you did ever put her in danger.”

“I let her walk into those dark, cold woods, day after day after day, and I never once thought to follow her! She kept us all alive, she ran herself ragged for us, and I did _nothing_ for her in return!” She took a steadying breath. “So don’t think for one second that I’m somehow better than you!”

Lucien straightened suddenly, both eyes wide. Elain didn’t let his bare skin scare her away as she poked him hard in the shoulder. “Do you know what bothers me most about this whole… mating bond business? It’s how you look at me like I’m _above_ you.” Her breath caught in her throat, and she fought the urge to touch her ring finger, bare ever since the day after they’d returned from the war. Even now, she still found herself reaching for it sometimes. “Graysen put me on a pedestal, too. And as soon as I fell short of that perfect image of myself he’d built up in his own head…”

She lowered her chin, and she saw Lucien’s hand move towards her, halting just inches away from her face. His fingers trembled as they retracted. “Graysen was a damned fool,” he growled.

Elain almost found herself agreeing. Almost. But even after all this time, after all he’d said and done, somehow hearing anyone speak ill of Graysen still sent a spear of pain through her chest. “He’s only a product of his upbringing.”

A soft laugh escaped him. “Your father was right about you. You really can find light in any darkness.”

She looked up at him through her lashes. “Is that so bad?”

“No,” he breathed, and Elain became acutely aware of how close she sat to him, of the rise and fall of his glistening chest, of the wisps of red hair brushing his left temple. “No, I’d say if more people saw things through your eyes, the world would be a much better place.”

Her gaze darted between his two eyes, the golden carved with graceful precision, the brown laced with molten amber. She touched his hand, and this time he did not recoil.

“No more nightmares, please,” she whispered.

“I will try.” A ghost of a smile flashed across his face. “If you ever have any pleasant dreams, feel free to send them to me.”

She lifted her eyebrows and laughed. “You as well.”

When she reached the door, he spoke again: “Thank you, Elain.”

The way he said her name sent a tingle racing up her spine. She looked over her shoulder at him, and as she beheld his tousled hair, his hunched shoulders, his bare feet, she wondered how she could have ever been afraid of him.

She smiled and opened the door. “You’re welcome.”

-

Lucien was quiet at breakfast the next morning. There were shadows under his eyes, and Elain wondered if he’d gotten much sleep after she’d left his room. She doubted that she looked much better, as she had tossed and turned for hours after returning to bed. Images from his nightmare had flashed through her mind and mingled with her own imaginings of those horrors he’d revealed to her.

That bottomless well of guilt in his eye, deeper and older than what had happened to her and her sisters… now she understood it.

After breakfast, Elain went out into the townhouse garden and made her rounds with the watering can. Only a moment later, Cerridwen was outside with her, appearing (as she and her sister often did) to materialize out of the shadows.

“Do you need anything, Elain?”

Elain smiled at her and the use of her first name that she had insisted upon when she’d first spoken to the twins. She was about to shake her head when she decided that a bit of assistance would be nice. “Would you mind filling up another watering can for me? It would save me an extra trip.”

Cerridwen inclined her head and left to find the other watering can. When she returned a few minutes later, she set the can down by the fountain in the center of the garden. She watched as Elain knelt beside a bed of deep purple petunias that she had planted several weeks ago.

Cerridwen’s voice was soft behind her: “Nuala and I are going into the city this afternoon to find more clothing for you and Lady Nesta.” Likely at Rhys or Feyre’s behest, now that Elain and Nesta were going to be permanent residents in Velaris. “Do you have any requests?”

Elain hummed in thought as she idly rearranged the border rocks of the flower bed. “Some casual dresses for gardening might be nice. I suppose longer sleeves would be best, since it’ll be cold soon.” She held out her arms to observe the odd gradient of tan lines she’d developed from her gardening ventures at the townhouse. As a human, Elain might have been aghast at how brown and freckled her forearms had become, at the series of lines that demarcated the lengths of the different sleeves she’d worn the past few months. Now, she found she rather liked the uneven tan of her arms. It was proof that she was not drowning in darkness anymore.

“Perhaps a jacket,” Cerridwen suggested, “or a sweater that you could work in?”

“Oh, yes! Like those comfy sweaters that Feyre wears. That would be lovely.” Her excitement dissipated as quickly as it had appeared. “Should I give you money for it all?”

Cerridwen shook her head and gave her a gentle smile. “The High Lady will be handling that.”

Elain forced herself to return the smile. “Right. Thank you, Cerridwen.”

Of course, after all this time, Feyre would still be taking care of her. The only real improvement was that Elain had even bothered to ask where the money was coming from. They’d traded the shack for a townhouse, starved human bodies for noble fae figures, yet Elain was still as spoiled and useless as ever.

Cerridwen bid her farewell and returned to the house, but she paused to greet someone at the door. As the door closed, Elain felt that familiar presence at the other end of the bond grow stronger.

She made to rise to greet him, but Lucien waved her back down and knelt beside her. Steam wafted off of a large mug that he carried in one hand. He glanced over his shoulder, back towards the house, and when he faced her again, one eyebrow quirked in an inquisitive expression. “So, how did _you_ learn to tell them apart?”

Elain bit her lip to stifle her laugh. “Cerridwen has a freckle.” She tapped on her left hand, at the base of her thumb. “Right here. I know them well enough to tell them apart now, but that was how I knew in those early days.” The inflection he’d used on the word “you” made it sound like he had his own method. “And what about you?”

One corner of his mouth twitched up in a secretive little smile. “Nuala tucks her hair behind her left ear, while Cerridwen usually leaves her hair loose in front of her ears. I had to ask for their names on three separate occasions before I was sure.” He held out the mug to her. “Here. I thought you might be thirsty.”

Indeed she was, and she accepted the cup gladly. It contained more of that spiced tea from yesterday. “Thank you. What sort of tea is this, anyway? I never had anything like it in the human lands.”

“Vassa’s soldiers got me to drink it when I was traveling with them. They called it ‘chai,’ said it comes from the southern part of the continent.”

“It’s delicious,” said Elain, savoring the rich scent as she took another sip.

Lucien settled fully onto the ground and brought one knee up to his chest, resting an elbow upon it. “I, um…” His gold eye watched her while the other stared at the purple flowers before them. “I wanted to apologize for last night. I’m sorry you got dragged into my nightmare like that. And I don’t know if you realize, but you really put yourself at risk trying to break me out of it. I could have… the fire, it might’ve gotten out of control. You could have called for Feyre or Rhys instead, which would have been much safer for you but rather humiliating for me; but you spared me that, at great risk to yourself, and--” He cut himself off with a steadying breath. “Thank you.”

“It was nothing,” she responded softly. Then she squared her shoulders and said in a stronger voice, “Besides, you said yourself that you’ve felt my nightmares before. It’s only fair that I feel yours, too.”

His answering smile was strained, and it faded quickly. “There’s something else. Something you said last night that’s been bothering me.” Uncertainty clenched at Elain’s heart as she went through her memories, trying to decide what she’d said that would have caused him offense. Both of his eyes were on her now. “You said that you did nothing for Feyre. You made it sound like you never once helped her.”

There it was. The truth of her greatest failure spoken aloud in the light of day. Tears pricked at her eyes as she tried to keep her voice steady, so that he would spare her no pity; she deserved none, after all. She wrapped her hands around the warm mug and whispered into the dark liquid, “It’s true.”

He tilted his head and studied the nearby flowers for a long moment before returning his gaze to her. “Back when Feyre and I were still at the Spring Court, on our rides through the woods, she would talk about her family. She told me a story about you. She said she’d earned some extra money, and with the share she gave to you, you went out and bought her three tins of paint.”

Elain shook her head and let out a haggard sigh. “Foolish. I was so foolish. That money would have been better spent on food or new hunting clothes for her. Something she really needed.”

“But are those the things she really needed?” When she frowned up at him, he continued, “Oh, sure, food and clothing are necessary for survival. But when we look around ourselves and find only tools for survival, we begin to forget who we are. Things like painting and music and poetry, they remind us of why we are surviving. Isn’t that why you kept your garden even in that miserable little shack? To remember who you were?” He stared down at the flowers. The sunlight glinting off the top of his head seemed to set his hair ablaze in a molten crown. “When my mother sang for me, when she taught me to play the piano, when she let me run through her garden like a wild beast, any of those frivolous things--it wasn’t because she thought it would make my life any easier. It was because she wanted to give me something bright in my heart to hold on to. And that’s what you did for your family.”

He lifted his head again to gaze at her. “Don’t ever think that you have done nothing, Elain. You bring light to any darkness, and that is so very important.”

Her breath caught in her throat at his words, at his eye trained on her unflinchingly. The gentleness, the understanding that she found there, it was too much for her. She did not deserve it. “That is very kind of you to say, but…” She dipped her head to avoid that thoughtful gaze. “They are buying me more clothes because Feyre wants to make sure I have everything I could want. And she’s paying for it herself because I have no money of my own. It makes me feel so useless.”

“Are you sure you have no money?” She raised an eyebrow at him and frowned. But Lucien shrugged, unfazed. “If Rhys can find a reason to pay me well enough, I’m sure he’d be providing his court Seer with a generous salary.”

Elain chewed on the inside of her mouth as she considered that statement. “Is that common, then?” she asked slowly. “For High Lords to… employ Seers?”

“I wouldn’t say anything about a Seer is _common_. They are rare and closely guarded by whatever court they choose to call home. As far as I’m aware, you are the first Seer to appear in my lifetime. There’s only one other that anyone knows about, and assuming she’s still alive, she’d be ancient even by our standards.”

This was the first Elain had ever heard of another Seer, and her heart quickened in a mix of fear and excitement. Azriel had helped her understand and nurture her powers as best he could, and continued to do so once a week now; but if Elain could meet this other Seer, could learn about this strange ability from one who had possessed it for centuries… “Where is she? This other Seer.”

Lucien winced, and Elain suspected that some of her thoughts had leaked through their bond and into his mind.. “I don’t want to get your hopes up. No one has heard anything from her in nearly a century.” But Elain didn’t back down in her intent stare, so he continued, “Although I suppose it’s possible she saw Amarantha coming and decided to lie low for a few decades. Amarantha would have certainly made use of a Seer, if she could have.”

A darkness had settled over Lucien’s face when he’d mentioned that name, the one that even Feyre had been hesitant to say when she’d recounted her hardships Under the Mountain. He rolled his shoulders, as if to dislodge the memories. “She’s from the Day Court, this Seer. They say, even in all her long years, she’s only left the Day Court a handful of times.”

Elain took another sip of her tea before setting the mug down on the grass. “Do you know much about this Seer?”

“More than I did a few months ago.” When she continued to watch him expectantly, he scratched his ear and gave a sheepish smile. “I studied up a bit. I wanted to learn more, after…”

After he’d found out what his mate was. The power she held. He wanted to understand it, to understand her. Elain gave him a soft smile, then asked, “Day Court--that’s Lord Helion, isn’t it?”

“Yes. The court that values knowledge above all else--I suppose it’s a fitting home for one who can see across time and space.” He furrowed his brows. “You know him, then?”

“I met him during the war. After I… after I was captured, he released the shackles the king used on me.” A small shudder ran through her as she recalled that terrifying night in Hybern’s camp, the screams of those humans, the whispers of the Cauldron that had lured her there.

Elain heard a metallic click and whirring that she’d come to recognize as the sounds of his mechanical eye focusing on something. She looked up to find him gazing at her with his lips slightly parted.

“You’ve been through so much,” he murmured, “so much that might have broken other humans and faeries.”

She thought of Feyre and Azriel, who had rescued her from that awful camp; of Nesta and Cassian, who had stood against Hybern’s king. She sighed, hoping she would not have to remind Lucien not to put her on a pedestal that she had not earned. “I had plenty of help. I had people holding my hand to pull me through.”

Lucien tilted his head as a gentle half-smile played across his face. “Don’t mistake this for flattery. I’m only telling you what I see. You emerged from those hardships still able to smile. To see beauty in the world. It takes a special strength to find goodness in a world that wronged you. It takes courage.”

Elain opened her mouth on instinctual desire to rebuke the praise, but those words he’d used gave her pause. _Strength. Courage._ Those were not words that people used to describe her. People would say she was beautiful, or gentle, or polite. She searched Lucien’s face for any sign of jest, but found only sincere admiration, and then, in the soft breath that escaped his lips, understanding. As if a piece of some puzzle had clicked into place.

“I used to think you were some frail, trembling fawn who needed to be protected. And everyone tried to protect you, didn’t they? Especially your sisters. Because you were the gentle one.” It was almost like he was talking to himself as he fit together more pieces of the puzzle. “You _had_ to be the gentle one. The one that they protected. You didn’t have a choice. You had to play the mediator for your sisters, always in the middle of their two raging storms. If you’d been as fierce as they were, you would have all torn each other apart.”

Elain’s shock must have been written plainly on her face; Lucien blinked once, and then his mouth snapped shut, and he turned away. “My apologies,” he said, oddly formal after that dive he’d taken into her soul. “Over analyzing. It’s a bad habit. I meant no offense, and I apologize if--”

“I took our mother’s death the hardest.”

As if speaking of her had summoned her voice, Elain could nearly hear her mother sternly telling her how rude it was to interrupt. But Lucien only looked intrigued. She let the words pour out in a rush. “My sisters had always looked out for me, but seeing how Mother’s death affected me… they seemed to band together for the first time, just to make sure I was all right. As the weeks went on, I realized that I didn’t miss _her_ ; I missed what she could have been, the mother I thought we would have someday. The one who would see us as more than her pretty dolls. And I had to face the reality that it would never be like that, even if she had survived.

“I never told any of that to my sisters. Even when I wasn’t sad anymore. They were fighting less, and I think worrying about me let them ignore whatever pain they were dealing with. So I let them dote on me, the way our mother never did. And I kept it up even after we lost our fortune.”

Lucien stretched his long legs out and leaned back on his elbows. He made no sound, but stared at her expectantly. It was as if he knew that she had not yet reached the bottom of the fetid waters of her soul.

She did not break his gaze as she whispered, “Feyre never asked me to help. When we were starving, when she was exhausted and we needed firewood, she never asked me for help. She’d ask Nesta, but never me. Because I was the weak one. The one to be protected. So she didn’t ask me to help, and I knew she never would. I knew I would never have to help, if I didn’t want to. So I never offered.

“I told myself that it was better this way, because she was so good at everything, and I would just get in her way. I told myself I’d make it up to her someday. When I realized she couldn’t read--it was only two years ago that I even noticed--I told myself I’d fix it someday, when we could afford a library again. When things were better, I’d make it up to her. Someday.”

When her voice broke on that last word, Lucien sat up straight. He glanced at her trembling hands, lifted his own, and then thought better of it. “‘Someday’ came on that battlefield,” he said. “The day you saved countless lives, including Feyre’s. And if you don’t think that was enough, well… like it or not, you have a very long time to make it up to her.”

Elain hugged her knees to her chest. “How do you even begin to atone for that sort of thing? Especially with someone like Feyre, who’s done so much for me, for the whole world?”

Lucien tilted his head back with a sigh. Some strands of his silken hair slipped off of his shoulders. “When I find out, I’ll let you know. In the meantime--” He jerked his chin in the direction of the river, somewhere beyond the garden wall. “There’s at least one neighborhood here with plenty of art supply stores.” Though his smile was gentle, his eye held a mischievous glint. “You could always start there.”

Elain dipped her chin to give him an incredulous glare beneath her furrowed brows. “You think I should _buy_ my sister’s forgiveness?”

Lucien raised his eyebrows. “You think, with all that you’ve both been through, Feyre is sitting around waiting to grant you forgiveness? I thought we were talking about forgiving yourself.”

She beheld that clever smile, those eyes that missed no details, as much by practiced perception as by enchanted mechanisms; and she realized that bit by bit, he was showing her his true self. He’d revealed the scars of his past last night. Now she could see the way his mind worked. It was quick and cunning and spared no dark truths that it found. Maybe it should have scared her, just how efficient his mind was. But he had seen her, had peered through the brambles where she hid the shadowed part of her soul. He’d let her step down from the pedestal, her sins laid bare in the cold light of day, and he had not recoiled.

Neither would she.

“Then let’s go into the city,” she said, taking his hand, “you and I, and let’s buy Feyre all the paints we can afford.”

Elain heard his heartbeat quicken as he gently wrapped his hand around hers. A pink blush kissed his golden-brown cheeks. “Actually… after we do that… I was wondering if there was something else in this city that you might like to do.”

-

Elain managed to catch Nuala and Cerridwen as they were leaving for their shopping venture, and she requested that they add a dress to their list.

When they asked her what sort of dress she was looking for, she had no hope of restraining the grin that blossomed on her flushed face. “Something I could wear to the theater.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay! I had more things I wanted to include in this chapter, but I figured it had gotten long enough. Next chapter will be a bit more light-hearted and fluffy. :)
> 
> Thank you for reading!! I hope you enjoy! ♥


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Why yes, I do like to throw shameless video game references into my fanfictions, and only god can judge me for it.

Lucien gave a sharp tug on the cuff of his jacket, more out of habit than the need to straighten any wrinkles. The fabric was new and impeccably tailored. Whoever had purchased it had a keen eye for coloring. The rich hunter green and gold-threaded detailing complemented his hair and complexion perfectly. Had he seen this jacket in a shop, his eye would have been immediately drawn to it.

He yanked the other sleeve, even though there were still no wrinkles to straighten. He’d been stalling for nearly ten minutes now.

There was a knock on the door, followed by a soft voice saying, “Master Lucien, you asked us to let you know when it was time.”

The voice belonged to either Nuala or Cerridwen; he still couldn’t tell them apart in that regard, much to his annoyance. He’d once prided himself on his attention to detail, but the Night Court seemed full of ways to strike at his ego.

Steeling himself with a deep breath, Lucien opened the bedroom door. The female waiting for him had her dark hair hanging loose around her face. Her eyebrows were a little less manicured than her sister’s, and her cheekbones almost imperceptibly narrower.

“Thank you, Cerridwen,” he said with a nod as they both stepped away from his door. “And thank you also for laying out the clothes for me. Were you the one who procured the jacket?”

Cerridwen shook her head. “Nuala has a far better eye for male clothing.”

“If you would, please give her my thanks as well.”

“Certainly,” she said with a demure dip of her chin. “Elain said she would be ready shortly.”

Lucien swallowed hard. “Right. Thank you.”

As Cerridwen glided silently down the hall towards Elain’s room, Lucien went downstairs. He planted himself by the small window next to the door and stared out it in a vain attempt to look occupied, and also to prevent himself from pacing.

Murmurs and the sound of pages turning came into the foyer from the sitting room to Lucien’s right. Rhys and Feyre spent more time at the townhouse these days, having finally found some respite after those hectic days following the war. They’d spent most of this afternoon in that room, simply reading and speaking softly to each other.

Feyre said something that Lucien couldn’t hear, and Rhys responded with a deep laugh, genuine and unabashed, like none he had ever heard from the High Lord of Night.

Lucien hated himself for the twinge of jealousy that twisted in his chest. No matter what Rhys had done over the centuries, Lucien could not begrudge them their happiness, the bond that they shared. Of all the people he knew, Rhys and Feyre had earned this peace the most. They had fought and suffered for it perhaps harder than anyone else, and they deserved those moments of shared laughter in a quiet home.

And yet, Lucien wondered what it was like to be that happy. To literally _glow_ with it as Feyre sometimes did. He’d long ago given up the hope of such happiness.

A female’s hushed voice drifted down into the foyer, a voice sweeter than birdsong, softer than a flower petal and infinitely more beautiful to his fevered heart.

And yet, he wondered.

When she came into view at the top of the stairs, Lucien swallowed a gasp.

Elain’s freckled face was a delicate shade of pink, intensified by the rouge brushed along her cheekbones. Some of her softly curling hair was swept up in a braided crown, while the rest cascaded over one shoulder. The intricate floral lace bodice of her lavender gown gave way to a gossamer skirt that floated around her like sunlight filtering through leaves. Dark kohl lining and pale pink powder upon her eyelids made her eyes stand out even more as they fixed upon him, those gentle brown eyes that smote him as thoroughly as a blow to the head.

She’d descended the staircase and stood before him now with her hands folded in front of her waist. Her smile broke into a nervous giggle, and it took far too much of Lucien’s willpower not to grab her by that tiny waist, to press her against the nearest wall and--

_My mate my mate MY MATE--_

_Oh, would you just_ piss off _?_ he roared back at that voice in his head.

He dug his nails into his palms and forced himself to meet Elain’s expectant gaze. “You look…” _Perfect. Exquisite. Like the gods crafted you themselves and wept at their masterpiece._ “Beautiful.”

Her blush deepened, and her narrow shoulders hunched together as she dipped her head shyly, and oh gods, if Lucien didn’t pull himself together soon, he was likely to set the entire house on fire. “Thank you.” She twirled a strand of hair around her finger as she looked up at him again. “You look quite nice as well.”

He inclined his head. Of course she would do the polite thing and return the compliment. “It seems Nuala has impeccable tastes in clothing.”

“Oh, yes.” Elain smoothed out her purple chiffon skirt. “I was worried that this would be too fancy for a theater outing, but they assured me I would blend right in.”

Lucien gave her a soft smile. “I’m afraid I must disagree. I would say you stand out wherever you go.”

Her eyes widened briefly before another nervous laugh bubbled out of her. “That’s kind of you to say, but…” Her whole face was red now. “But I think you might be a bit biased.” She glanced up at him through eyelashes that were thicker and darker than normal, and a hint of mischief lurked in her smile. “Or maybe you’re being a shameless flatterer.”

Lucien raised his eyebrows and gestured at himself in mock offense. “Me? No indeed, lady, I only speak the truth.” He gave her a mischievous smile of his own. “Don’t you know that faeries are incapable of lying?”

She narrowed her eyes. “Hmm, yes. I’ve also heard that faeries cannot stand iron.”

“But that is true, at least for my part. I happen to find iron to be quite the eyesore.” He shrugged. “If I must wear metal, I’d much prefer gold.”

She covered her mouth to stifle another giggle. “Copper would suit you as well.”

“Aren’t you two going to be late?”

They both turned towards the amused drawl coming from the sitting room. Rhys, who’d spoken, was mostly hidden from their sight, but they could certainly see Feyre, who was leaning so far off of the couch to watch them that her hair was touching the floor. She grinned and waggled her fingers at them in a wave.

“You two have fun!” she said.

Lucien rolled his eyes, but he couldn’t fight his smile. He turned back to Elain, whose shoulders shook in barely suppressed laughter. “Shall we go?”

Elain cleared her throat to compose herself. She lifted her chin, and without hesitation, wrapped her arm around Lucien’s elbow. “Lead the way, my lord.”

As they opened the door, Rhys called out after them in a singsong voice, “Don’t stay out too late, children!”

When they were outside, Elain finally released the laughter she’d been restraining. Though his heart was pounding in her presence, at the touch of her arm entwined with his, as he watched her nose crinkle and her eyes squeeze shut in her mirth, Lucien couldn’t help but laugh with her.

“How does it feel,” he asked, jerking his chin back towards the townhouse they now walked away from, “having _that_ as a brother-in-law?”

Through her giggles, she replied, “Well, he’s not technically my brother-in-law. They’re not married yet.”

“No, but they’re--” He clamped his mouth shut around that word he desperately needed to avoid. _Watch yourself, you daft bastard. Don’t ruin… whatever tonight is._ He cleared his throat. “They might as well be. I’m sure a wedding isn’t too far off.”

Too late, he realized he’d managed to use another word that might dredge up bad memories. Indeed, Elain’s smile had faded, her eyes cast down onto the cobblestones. Wincing, Lucien muttered, “I’m sorry, I--”

“It’s all right.” Though her voice was light, her gaze had grown distant. “It would be rather troublesome if everyone had to avoid saying certain words around me.”

Lucien frowned. “It’s not troublesome. I admit, I’m not always the most considerate person, but… I’d like that to change.” _I’d like to become someone who might come close to deserving you._ “And if that means avoiding words that upset you, it will be well worth the effort.”

Her eyes focused on him again, and a hint of a smile returned to her face. “I’d say you are quite considerate.”

He snorted. “Tell that to Feyre, she’ll get a good laugh out of it. She thought I was a real prick when she first met me, and rightfully so.”

“Feyre said…” Her brows furrowed. “The faerie she killed in the woods that day, the one disguised as a wolf… he was a friend of yours.”

“Andras,” he muttered, and Elain’s grip on his arm tightened. “Still, I could have been more sympathetic to her when she first arrived. It’s not like she knew who he was at the time. And she regretted what happened, even then.”

Before the conversation could continue its grim descent into the unhappy past, Lucien stopped in the middle of the street and stared ahead. The bridge was still a mile away at least. He turned to Elain and asked, “Would you prefer if we winnowed there? It would give us more time to find our seats. And… maybe explore the theater, if you’d like. I’ve never seen it before, myself.”

“Oh.” She followed where his gaze had traveled, away towards the river, and then she looked up at the darkening sky. Though the sun’s fiery hues still stretched across the western horizon, already countless stars had broken through the blue expanse overhead. The stars always emerged far earlier here and lingered into dawn. “I suppose that would be best. But…” She turned towards him again, and Lucien kept his eyes locked on hers to avoid watching how she bit her lip. “As long as we can walk back afterwards. I’ve hardly seen the city at night, and Feyre says it’s wonderful.”

“Of course. Whatever you’d like.” He glanced down at where their arms were still joined, then gave her a small smile. “Ready?” When she nodded, he winnowed them both further into the city, right in front of a hill topped by a stately domed building.

Lucien felt a shudder run through Elain. “I don’t think I’ll ever get used to that,” she said.

“I tend to prefer walking,” he admitted. “I try to reserve winnowing for long distance travels.”

“Or when you're running late to the theater?”

“Or that, yes.”

The theater before them was ancient, judging by some of the architectural details, but lovingly preserved, from its gold-plated dome down to the intricate marble carvings of the arched entryway. Hundreds of faeries, high fae and lesser all mingled together, streamed in and out of the open doors. Theater workers, identifiable by their smart black-and-white suits, distributed programs and offered directions.

Elain took a program and recited the title of the feature aloud, her eyes widening as she read: “‘The Stolen Princess’...” A smile broke through her shocked expression as she looked up at Lucien. “This is one of the ten Norbright Fantasies! They show his plays here in Prythian?”

It was Lucien’s turn to be surprised. “You’re familiar with them?”

“Of course! I grew up reading them. We had a collection in the library. ‘The Stolen Princess’ was my favorite. But… Norbright was a human playwright. I never would have thought to see his plays being performed here.”

“Well, in Prythian, they’re known as the Urseon Fantasies.”

Elain’s nose wrinkled. “Urseon?”

They slowly made their way into the grand entrance hall as Lucien explained, “Urseon was the fae composer who collaborated with Norbright on the Ten Fantasies.”

“I never saw the plays performed, so I’m afraid I’ve never heard the music. I had no idea there was a faerie involved in them.”

With any other person, on any other night, Lucien might have bemoaned the thought of only _reading_ the Ten Fantasies, of not hearing the exquisite music that accompanied the stories, that were so intricately entwined with them. But Elain had been a human living in dour lands, had spent years in poverty, and she certainly wasn’t the only one. _Empathy_ , he reminded himself. “Yes. And it’s not surprising that you never heard of him. The Fantasies were written shortly before the Wall went up. It would make sense, in the generations that followed, if the humans wanted to downplay the faerie half of that collaboration. It’s been the same here, to be honest. Some high fae have tried to claim that Urseon wrote all of them alone, music and story alike. Or else they’ll stage only symphonies dedicated to the music and ignore the stories that went with it. And Urseon died nearly four hundred years ago, so he can’t set anyone straight about it.”

Elain chewed on her lip. She tilted her head back, and Lucien followed her gaze up to the magnificent mural painted on the antechamber ceiling. It depicted scenes from some of Prythian’s most famous plays and operas, including iconic characters from the Ten Fantasies: a ship flying through the air, a warrior with a helm like a dragon’s head, a magic-wielding boy who called down flaming meteors from the sky.

“Maybe,” Elain mused, “now that the Wall is down, humans will remember the music. It would be nice if something good could come of what happened.”

“And maybe,” Lucien said, “faeries will remember the stories.”

-

An usher led them to the High Lord’s personal box seats, to the left of the stage, angled to give them a full range of vision. Elain perched herself on the very edge of her seat and gripped the wooden railing in front of them. Her knees bounced as she beamed at Lucien. “I hardly ever got to see a real performance when we were children, and never one of the Ten Fantasies. I’m so glad you picked this one.”

Gods, but he was glad, too. “The Tenth is my personal favorite, but Feyre said you preferred happy endings.”

“Oh, the Tenth is so very sad, but it is beautiful. Nesta thinks this one is more shallow than the others, but I don’t think so.”

“It’s not as violent or somber as some of the others, but I don’t think that makes it shallow.” Lucien smirked, remembering how one of the Fantasies depicted a world-altering catastrophe right before the intermission. “Let me guess--Nesta’s favorite is the Sixth?”

Elain’s giggle was answer enough.

The fae lights dimmed, and the familiar notes that signaled the introductory theme, the same one used in all the Ten Fantasies, sounded out from the orchestra pit. Beside him, Elain gasped, a hand on her chest, and Lucien recalled the first time he had heard those opening chords as they built to a sweeping crescendo. He’d been only a boy, his mother’s arms tight around his shoulders as she, too, was swept away by the song. Hearing those notes again, he could almost imagine her there with them, drifting away from all her troubles on the air of golden trumpets.

As the curtain lifted, the grandeur of the opening faded to the wistful piano theme that was woven throughout this, the Ninth Fantasy, and the titular princess appeared on the stage. When the strings of the orchestra rose to join the piano, Lucien felt a soft hand upon his wrist. Clenching his teeth to stifle a gasp, he risked a glance to the lady at his side. Elain still had her free hand resting upon her chest, as if she could hardly keep breathing. When she met his gaze, her brown eyes were rimmed with tears, and she smiled freely at him.

And, well, Lucien was not so timid that he did not recognize an invitation when he saw one.

Slowly, so very slowly, he rotated his arm so that it faced palm-up, and Elain slipped her hand into his. She gave his fingers a gentle squeeze before returning her attention to the stage.

The first two acts flew by in a haze of elaborate costumes, pyrotechnics, and swordplay, but it was the hand entwined with his that threatened to overwhelm his senses. When the curtain lowered and the fae lights brightened to signal the intermission, Lucien braced himself for her to pull away. But she only held his hand tighter as she turned to face him with bright eyes and flushed cheeks.

“I don’t think I can ever just read one of these again! Tell me, are they all this good, or have you seen better performances?”

“I’ve seen many performances, but to be honest, this one blows them all away.” He used his mechanical eye to peer into the orchestra pit. “Their pianist is incredible.”

“Didn’t you say your mother taught you to play the piano?”

He raised his brows at the question. “Yes, when I was a child.”

“Do you still play?”

“It’s been… a very long time, but I’m sure I could pick it back up, if I found myself in front of the keys again.”

She lowered her head while keeping his gaze, and her smile turned a bit shy. “Maybe you could play the music from the other Fantasies for me, someday. I’d love to hear more.”

Lucien found himself smiling despite the redness blooming on his cheeks. “It would be laughable compared to what you’ve heard tonight.”

She gave a soft _hmph_ and replied, “Why don’t you let me be the judge of that?”

Seeing the twinkle in her eye that threatened to break through her mask of indignation, Lucien chuckled and said, “If you wish it, lady, you need only lead me to a piano, and I will gladly torment your ears with my playing.”

Elain’s expression instantly brightened. “It’s a deal, then!” Glancing back at the stage for a moment, she leaned in close and said in a rushed, low voice, “That explosion when they were escaping the castle scared me half to death. I thought the stage would catch fire!”

He twisted in his chair so he could face her fully. “The swords clashing during the fight on the bridge sounded like real steel.”

They continued to chatter about the amazing effects and songs of the performance, neither feeling the need to separate their hands, and they did not stop talking until the curtain rose once again.

-

“Lucien, look!”

He let Elain drag him--she still hadn’t let go of his hand--over to a schedule posted to the wall outside the theater. She pointed to the line that had caught her sharp eyes. “They’re playing the Tenth Fantasy next week. You said that was your favorite, right? We have to go see it!” Before he could reply, her excitement vanished. “I mean, if Rhys and Feyre are all right with us using their theater seats… I shouldn’t presume.”

“We’ll go see it,” he said, drawing as close to her as he dared--not that he could go too far away without the risk of losing the hand he dearly wanted to hold onto. “And if they don’t want us to use their seats for whatever reason, then we’ll just have to buy our own tickets.”

Her shoulders loosened as she let out a sigh. “Right, of course. I’ve always assumed that Feyre would take care of things for me, and I don’t want to be like that anymore.”

Lucien drew his thumb across the back of her hand. “Shouldn’t be too hard, now that you know what you’re capable of.”

She looked up at him through her eyelashes. “And what am I capable of?”

“Hmm.” Lucien swung their joined hands back and forth and let a smirk creep onto his lips. “How about keeping me company while I explore this city?”

Elain released his hand, only to wrap her arm around his elbow. “I can certainly do that. I think someone had the idea of buying paints for my sister?”

And so they set off, arm in arm, though the streets of Velaris and towards the cluster of colorful buildings known as the Rainbow. Lucien had heard, in his brief forays into the city before he’d left for the continent, that the Rainbow was the artistic center of Velaris. They were sure to find all sorts of art supplies there; Lucien’s only concern was timing, as it was now only three hours until midnight. He had no idea what time the shops of the Rainbow would close, but judging by all the open doors and lit interiors they passed on the way, he liked their odds.

“Oh, it’s beautiful,” Elain breathed as they rounded the corner to find the first few vivid buildings of the Rainbow.

Lucien’s eyes traveled every which way, trying in vain to soak in all the details, every colored brick, every stained glass lantern, all the faeries wandering in and out of the shops and studios and galleries. “This city does love to impress me.”

“I know,” she said with a sigh, “It’s almost exhausting in a way, isn’t it? I feel like I’ll never get used to it.” She tugged on his elbow, pulling him towards a nearby shop. “Let’s try this one--I see paintbrushes!”

They walked through the open door of the narrow purple building to find a single, long room stuffed with tables and shelves full to bursting with brushes, charcoal, and other artistic implements that Lucien did not have names for. Blank canvases of varying sizes were stacked up against the walls wherever space was available. They found the paints in the back of the shop, where the entire wall was covered in shelves laden with containers of paint.

Elain’s gaze drifted across the jars and tins, arranged by color in a motley rainbow, lighter shades at the top and darker at the bottom. Each container had a small wooden peg beside it, painted to display the container’s contents. Lucien had never realized that so many shades of green existed in the world.

“Where do we even start?” Elain mused.

Lucien shrugged. “Why not start with the colors you got her before?” He smirked when she met his gaze. “I hear she used them all up back in your cabin, so she’ll likely want more.”

Laughing, Elain swatted him on the arm, so lightly that he barely felt it, but for the fact that his blood sang at every slight touch she gave him. She grabbed three jars, and one by one handed them to Lucien, without even looking to see if he managed to hold on to all of them. “Red, yellow, and blue. The shopkeeper in our village told me that those were the essential colors.” She tapped a finger against her lips. “What else?”

Lucien quietly and gratefully accepted the basket that the shopkeep surreptitiously passed him, setting his three jars within. “Black and white?” he offered.

“Oh, of course!” Two more jars were added to the basket. “And this green is gorgeous, I’m sure she’ll want that. Oh, and this purple.”

It was only when their basket was near to overflowing that Elain finally conceded they’d picked enough. They brought their haul to the shopkeep’s counter, where the blue-skinned faerie began the long task of marking their selections in her ledger book.

While the shopkeep worked, Elain gave Lucien a sheepish glance. “You were right, by the way. Rhys is paying me. He set up an account for me that I can use all over the city.”

Lucien would have been more surprised if Rhys _hadn’t_ found a way to give Feyre’s sisters an income, especially when Elain had such a valuable power. “I only hope he’s paying you what you’re worth.”

She quirked a playful eyebrow. “And what would you say that is?”

_No gold or gems could come even close._ He swallowed the thought and said instead, “More than he’s paying me, at the very least.”

“But you have prior experience in your field, while I am a novice. Wouldn’t that make you more valuable?”

“Ah, but even a seasoned emissary is nothing compared to a Seer, no matter her age or experience.”

Elain rocked slowly on her heels as she hummed in thought. “I think you sell yourself far too short, sir.”

It would be too easy to drown in the warmth of her brown eyes. So he let his gaze linger for only a moment before he inclined his head and murmured, “You are too kind, lady.”

A polite little cough reminded Lucien that he and Elain were not, in fact alone. To her credit, the shopkeep gave no outward indication of annoyance as she read off the final cost of all the paints. Lucien asked, “Could you split it and let me pay half?” He glanced at Elain and added, “If you don’t mind, that is.”

“Are you sure?” she asked with raised brows. It had been no small amount. Lucien had never realized how expensive paints were. The idea of Elain spending her paltry allowance on those three tins of paint, only to make her sister happy, struck him even more forcefully than before.

“There’s no way any of us can repay Feyre for what she’s done,” he replied, “but I’ll take any opportunity I can to do something for her.”

Now the shopkeep couldn’t mask her expression. She leaned forward with wide eyes and exclaimed, “These are for the High Lady?”

“Yes,” said Elain quickly, “but we _must_ pay for it. Feyre would be so upset if she found out you’d given these to us for free!”

It took a bit more negotiating from Lucien--and no small amount of plaintive looks from Elain--to convince the shopkeep to let them pay for the paints, although she did force a substantial discount on them. She also insisted on delivering them personally to the townhouse the next morning, which Lucien was amenable to--he trusted the fae who owned an art store more than he trusted himself with carrying a mountain of paints across Velaris.

It also let Lucien leave the store with empty hands, which allowed Elain to grasp them and declare, “There’s a market over there--let’s go!”

He followed her into the cobblestone streets beneath the stars, shining more brightly than he’d ever seen; but even their light was as nothing compared to the grin she turned upon him. He would have followed her anywhere. And he realized, with a jolt to his chest, that the animalistic voice growling in his feral faerie heart might not have anything to do with it.

Elain led him into the nearby market, still bustling despite the late hour. Together they perused the store fronts and free-standing carts full of glittering jewelry and blown glass trinkets and intricately woven fabrics. Their noses tracked spices drifting off of steaming meats and vegetables, but Elain seemed most drawn to the desserts. One cart in particular had rows and rows of round chocolate truffles on display that made Elain’s tongue flick across her lips. Even as his knees went a bit weak, he slapped a stack of coins onto the cart’s countertop and leaned upon it.

Elain’s wide eyes turned upon him. “Are you certain?” She wrung her hands together and gave him a nervous smile. “We did spend a lot of money just now.”

Not that it mattered to him. Lucien was quite certain he would spend any amount of money he had on her. Gods, he was becoming such a sap, and he couldn’t even bring himself to be annoyed about it. He merely shrugged and replied, “Surely a few coins more won’t hurt.”

She laughed. “At this rate, you’ll never move out of Rhys’s townhouse!”

Though it was a very real concern of his, he brushed it off with a wave of his hand. “I’m sure Rhys and Feyre can afford me for a little while longer.” He nodded at the assortment of truffles before them. “Which ones do you want?”

Elain selected five truffles (“Any more than that and I’m sure I’ll be sick!” she’d insisted) which were then wrapped and placed in a little box. Lucien followed her once again through the streets of Velaris, and as they crossed the great bridge over the Sidra, he realized that she had a particular destination in mind.

“I want to see how our flowers are doing,” she explained as they passed through the iron archway at the garden’s entrance.

Elain knelt down between the two flower beds that made up their little corner of the garden. The sunflowers swayed behind her, their broad, heart-shaped leaves creating a felicitous backdrop for her as she brushed gentle fingertips over the foliage of the chrysanthemums. If Feyre could see her sister now, Lucien was sure she’d want to paint her. Wisps of golden-brown hair framed her lightly furrowed brow as she examined her charges in the dim light of the garden.

Lucien summoned a small plume of fire and shaped it as near to a bird as the flames could manage. He sent it fluttering over to where Elain knelt, casting a warm glow and offering more light for her inspection. Her lips parted when she saw it, and though she gave him a wary look, he did not miss the delight in her eyes. “You will be careful with that, won’t you? I’d hate for our hard work to go up in flames.”

“You needn’t worry. I pride myself on my control.”

The smile in her eyes spread to the rest of her face as she continued inspecting the plants. When she was satisfied, Lucien offered a hand to help her stand, which she took and did not release. They sat down upon a bench of wood and iron that faced their sunflowers. Elain set her box of truffles open in her lap, and only then did she let go of his hand. Her knee, however, was perilously close to his. Lucien seemed to have developed a hypersensitivity to every part of her body and its proximity to his own, which he didn’t quite mind. As torturous as it was to be so aware of his mate’s body, it at least meant he was in little danger of accidentally touching her.

“What is the prognosis?” he asked. “Will they survive the winter?”

“I can’t say for sure yet, but I do think they will last the autumn.” She selected one of the truffles and held it to her lips for a moment, breathing in the scent. When she finally took a bite, her brows knitted together, and the low groan that reverberated deep in her throat nearly set loose the beast lurking under Lucien’s skin. He clenched his teeth, his fists, and forced his gaze from her face.

But the evening seemed intent on torturing him further, because before she’d even finished chewing the truffle in her mouth, she held the box in front of him and said, “You _have_ to try one. This is the most delicious chocolate I’ve ever had.”

He was still so flustered by that sound she’d made, his senses so overwhelmed by her scent, her slender fingers, the way she stretched her neck, that his hand almost made it to the box before he froze.

His voice thick, Lucien said, “I’d better not.”

His words finally broke Elain from her chocolate-induced reverie. She swallowed, frowning. “Oh… surely this doesn’t count.” When he made no reply, her voice grew heated. “But you were the one who bought these!”

Lucien stared straight ahead, his hands clenched upon his knees. “I’d rather not take the risk.”

“Well, what would even happen?” she cried. Lucien flinched at her evident frustration, though he could hardly blame her for it. “No one’s told me _that_ yet, either!”

“I…” He shifted on the bench, frowning. “I really have no idea. For all I know, it’s merely symbolic, no more binding than a handshake among humans. But… well, like I said, I don’t want to take the risk.”

There was nothing at all erotic about the groan she let out then. “I wish this wasn’t so complicated! I wish I could just get to know you without having to think about all these extra rules, and sometimes I just get so _distracted_ when I look at you, and I can’t tell if it’s my own feelings or if it’s this mating bond pushing me around, and--” She stamped her feet and clenched her fists and gave the prettiest scowl Lucien had ever seen. “Ooh, I could _kick_ that bloody Cauldron!”

Lucien expected himself to linger on the fact that Elain found him to be a _distraction_ ; instead, his thoughts were overtaken by the mental image of her standing before the instrument of death and life, the source of all creation, and hiking up her skirts to give it a solid kick. The laugh burst out of him before he could stop it.

He held his hand in front of his mouth in an attempt to stifle further laughter, or at least hide his grin. “Sorry,” he muttered in a trembling voice. But then, unbidden, the image repeated itself, only this time his imagination had Elain giving a fierce warrior shriek as her leg connected with the Cauldron in a loud _CLANG_. He snorted into his hand.

Elain’s scowl held for only a moment longer before she, too, dissolved into a fit of laughter. Their hysterics only worsened when a very indelicate snort escaped Elain.

Several minutes later, as Elain wiped tears from her eyes and Lucien took a few steadying breaths, his thoughts drifted back to what she’d confessed so flippantly. “So,” he asked, watching her out of the corner of his eye, “what exactly is it that you find _distracting_ about me?”

Her eyes went wide. “Oh! Is-- is that the word I used?” But as she stammered in search of a reply, an image came barrelling down the bond and straight into Lucien’s mind, a very clear image of his own two hands.

“Ah,” he said, a little smile quirking his lips.

Elain’s back straightened, and she pointed a stern finger at him. “Now you listen here, Lucien Vanserra: You’ve been a perfect gentleman so far, and I expect that you won’t take advantage of anything you might’ve just learned!”

“Take advantage?” Lucien scoffed, even as he placed his chin in his hand. Slowly he stretched his fingers out to their fullest extent and tapped them one by one upon his cheek. His other hand he held prominently in front of him, as if he was examining his nails. “I wouldn’t dream of it.”

A high-pitched cry, very nearly a squeak, escaped her, and she shifted in the bench to show her back to him. “Well, mating bond or no, I rescind my offer of sharing these chocolates with you!”

“That’s quite all right,” he replied. “I prefer fruit as my dessert anyway.”

She peeked over her shoulder to wrinkle her nose at him; but there was a smile beneath it.

It might’ve been an hour later when they turned down the quiet side street that would lead them back to the townhouse. Or it might have been longer, as Lucien saw how far the crescent moon had drifted across the sky. They were two houses away when Elain halted.

Lucien’s brows drew together as he watched her chew her lip. “Elain?”

His worry dissipated when she met his gaze, and he realized that she’d been trying to hide a smile. “You know that Nesta is waiting for us, don’t you?”

He stuffed his hands in his jacket pockets and raised an eyebrow. “Should I sneak in through the back window? It would be fun to relive my ignoble youth.”

She laughed and shook her head. “Oh, no, you mustn’t show fear around Nesta. You have to face her with head held high.” After a pause, she added, “But don’t linger, just in case.”

“I certainly hope I have not done anything tonight that would scandalize her.”

“You did tease me a bit.”

He inclined his head. “I am sorry. You need only say the word, and I’ll make sure to never tease you again.”

Elain clasped her hands behind her back. “I don’t mind. I’d much rather be teased than be treated like I’m made of glass.” She continued walking towards the townhouse, but slowed her pace so that they were side by side, and she nudged him with her elbow. “Besides, if that’s the worst you have to offer, then it’s nothing I can’t handle.”

His voice grew soft and reverent, as it so often did when he spoke to her. “I think you are capable of handling far more than people would expect.”

She didn’t reply, and he could not read her expression as they continued on in silence.

They’d nearly made it to the townhouse steps when Lucien felt the press of Elain’s lips upon his cheek.

He didn’t dare to breathe. The kiss was soft and lingering, and even after she pulled away, the warmth of her lips was like a brand upon his skin.

Elain threw the door open and darted inside, but not quickly enough for Lucien to miss the smile on her blushing face.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this took so long! Work has been kicking my ass lately. Thank you all so much for reading!!


	7. Chapter 7

They did return to the theater the following week, after Rhys and Feyre had insisted that they had no problem giving up their private seats for the night. The performance was just as breathtaking as the last, though the ending was even more heartbreaking to watch than it had been to read. Elain could understand why Lucien enjoyed this play the most, especially with his appreciation for music. This play’s music was full of emotion, at times peaceful, at times haunting, sometimes sorrowful enough to bring her to tears with only a few chords.

The music had also stoked a very particular desire that Elain had been nursing deep in her heart, when she’d glanced at Lucien during a mournful piano solo to find his free hand (the one she was not holding) tapping out the notes on his knee. As she watched his long, elegant fingers move with practiced surety, the desire in her heart became a mission.

She’d gone to Rhys the next day with a request. He gave her a name, and even escorted her to the location in the heart of Velaris’s theater district. There, he introduced Elain to one of the only two faeries she’d ever seen who actually looked _old_. The elderly male, kind and clearly fond of his High Lord, agreed to help Elain.

Now she only needed the courage to tell Lucien.

Another week had passed since she’d finalized her plan, and she mulled it over in her head as she and Lucien ate a quiet lunch in the garden. Such lunches had occurred often enough now for Elain to think of them as a tradition; though with autumn ever more apparent in the chill air, she knew they would soon have to take this tradition indoors.

She watched Lucien’s russet gaze trace the path of a bouncing finch in a nearby tree, his sharp cheekbone resting upon one of his slender hands. A faint smile softened the sharp, cunning features of his face, his mind seemingly occupied by no matter more or less important than the dance of a round little bird flitting between jewel-toned leaves. His smile deepened when he noticed her attention on him, and when a few weeks ago she would have looked away shyly, she now held his gaze, and she realized that she would not mind so much when they moved their lunches inside so long as they continued.

“I’ve always enjoyed autumn,” she said, turning her gaze towards the flaming leaves overhead. She hunched her shoulders as a shudder swept through her, brought on by either the chill wind or her own giddiness, she was not sure which. “Even when I should not have.”

He lifted his head from his hand, abandoning the lazy pose for quizzical alertness. She’d seen that expression several times in the past two weeks: it usually meant she’d presented him, knowingly or not, with another puzzle piece of herself. “And why should you have ever not enjoyed autumn?”

Elain folded her hands in her lap and forced herself to keep his curious gaze. “Because it meant life was going to get much harder for us all, and for Feyre, it would be much more dangerous.”

Lucien nodded and once again put his cheek in his hand. She wasn’t sure if he had been taking wicked advantage of her admission weeks ago, or if she’d simply gotten worse about staring. Fortunately, she’d managed to hide from him all the other features that drew her gaze when he wasn’t looking, like the silky hair that she longed to touch, or the sensuous lips.

Before her mind could drift into dangerous territory, Lucien asked, “What do you like about autumn?”

She took a deep breath and smiled, her eyes fluttering shut as she filled her nose with the crisp scents of crinkling leaves and fallen chestnuts--if there was one thing she could appreciate about her new body, it was the strange strength of her nose. “I love watching the leaves change and fall, I love seeing all the odd little mushrooms that pop up, I love bundling up with a scarf and gloves. There’s this peacefulness about it, this quiet, like the whole world is huddling under a blanket and preparing for sleep. It’s cozy, and soft, and…” When she opened her eyes, she found Lucien watching her with a heavy-lidded gaze and a wistful smile. “Warm,” she finished with a smile of her own.

Lucien straightened but kept his smile. It made him look soft and serene, none of that nervous intensity that sometimes seemed to course through him. “I would expect you to prefer spring. Far better for gardening.”

“Oh, spring is my favorite, but I think there is something to enjoy about all the seasons.” She wrinkled her nose. “Except winter. I can never seem to enjoy winter, no matter how hard I try. I feel like I’m always stuck inside with nothing to do, and I just get so…” She trailed off with a frustrated sigh when she could not think of the right word.

Lucien quirked an eyebrow. “‘Bored’?”

Elain narrowed her eyes. “Are you done eating?” she asked sharply.

That same searching expression from before mingled with delight on his face. “I am.”

“Good.” Standing, she snatched his hand and pulled him up with her. “I want to take you somewhere.”

Because after he’d thrown that boredom comment back in her face, she’d decided: she was _definitely_ making him play the piano for her.

-

Lucien was a good sport about being dragged through the bustling streets. He didn’t ask where they were going as they weaved between the crowds, her hand grasping his. He radiated warmth on the chilly day.

They were holding hands more and more the past few days, always at Elain’s initiation and always when they were alone. It was something new for her, to be the one taking the lead. Though she’d been receptive to Graysen’s advances, they were always _his_ advances. She certainly had not been the first to initiate a kiss in that relationship.

Elain felt her face flush at the memory of that night two weeks ago, when she had kissed Lucien’s cheek before practically running to her room. She’d only repeated the act twice more since then, once after saying goodnight (and after a few glasses of wine that had made her brave), and once after he’d teased her for not knowing the name of a flower outside a restaurant. It had certainly silenced the teasing, and had also turned his tanned face a brilliant shade of dark crimson. It wasn’t often that Elain got to render someone speechless, and Lucien in particular, as she had discovered, wasn’t often at a loss for words.

He was quiet now, seemingly content to let himself be dragged through Velaris. She looked back to find him smiling at her. “Aren’t you going to ask where I’m taking you?”

Lucien shrugged. “Maybe I want to be surprised.”

But Elain could see and hear how his gold eye darted to and fro, absorbing their surroundings. “No, you’re trying to guess.”

“Am I that easy to read?”

She lifted her chin and gazed sidelong at him with what she hoped was a mischievous smile. “You don’t like to not know things.”

His eyebrows rose and fell in brief consideration. “That’s true. Unfortunately it’s happening more and more these days.” With his free hand, he gestured vaguely at their surroundings, no doubt in reference to this city that was strange even to his centuries of experience.

Elain didn’t know if he needed it, but she squeezed his hand anyway, in reassurance, in solidarity. This city was strange to her, too, and noisy, and large, and overwhelming. She didn’t know if she could ever love Velaris the way that Feyre did, but she was beginning to see its good qualities.

She halted in front of a narrow door, part of a building squeezed between two taller ones. A faded blue-and-gold sign above the door read simply _Stellaria_ , the family name of the faerie who owned the establishment.

Lucien’s eyes widened as they settled upon the sign.

“That’s--”

But Elain had already started to drag him through the doorway.

The elderly fae male sat at a table inside the cramped entrance. He was holding up some sort of iron wire to the light and peering at it behind round spectacles. He looked away from the wire long enough to return Elain’s smile.

“Take as much time as you like, Lady Archeron,” he said in a wavering but kindly voice. “I will be out here if you need anything. And do give the High Lord and Lady my regards.”

“I will, sir, thank you!”

She pulled a still-gaping Lucien through the entryway and into the room beyond.

“This is--was that--” But all his questions died on his tongue as he beheld the piano sitting in the center of the next room.

Elain quietly closed the door behind her and came up to stand next to him. “You seemed like you recognized this place.”

“I…” Lucien blinked several times and tore his gaze away from the piano to look at Elain. “Stellaria is the most famous piano maker in Prythian. I had no idea that he was here in Velaris.” He blew out a haggard sigh and glared out the nearby window, as if he could glare all the way across the city to wherever Rhys was. “This damned city,” he muttered, “I swear…” He slowly began to circle the piano, running faint, reverent touches over it, leaning down to peer at hidden spaces.

Elain was happy to watch him study the piano with an almost childlike wonder, until he suddenly lifted his head and stared at her with wide eyes. “You planned this?”

She swallowed, clasping her hands in front of her. “Rhys suggested it,” she responded quickly, “when I asked him where I’d find a piano in this city. I had no idea that this place was so famous.” She ran the fabric of her skirt between her fingers in a fidgety motion, a habit that her mother had never managed to purge. “I suppose that makes me rather ignorant.”

Lucien had gone back to gaping at the piano, but he spared her a glance with furrowed brows. “No one whose opinion matters would ever call you ignorant.”

She smiled, but tendrils of anxiety were knotting throughout her stomach. It had all seemed much simpler in her imagination. “I brought you here because I wanted to hear you play, but… maybe it’s a bit presumptuous of me.”

He set the tips of his long fingers upon the side arm of the piano, as close as he could get to the keys without touching them. “We had a deal, didn’t we? You provide a piano, and I will torment your ears with my playing.”

A shaky laugh escaped her. “I’m sure you’re not _that_ bad.”

“I’m over a century out of practice.”

Her eyes widened, and her voice was soft when she asked, “It’s been that long?”

“Since I left Autumn,” he replied. His fingers moved to hover over the keys.

“I can leave,” she whispered, “if you'd rather be alone.”

He sat down on the bench, facing away from her, his shoulders hunched and his head hanging low over the keys, and he did not answer her. She had turned to leave when he finally replied in a slow, rough voice, “I want you to stay.”

So Elain approached the bench and sat down where he had made room for her, though she still felt awkward, like an intruder about to witness something immensely private.

And then he pressed the first key.

Even to her untrained ear, those first few notes sounded hesitant, strung together without any real melody. She watched as he brought his other hand up, could not tear her gaze away as his deft fingers danced over the keys in a seemingly random pattern. The sounds they made were a beautiful cacophony, like a forest full of birds vying for attention, and she could not pinpoint the moment when they weaved together into a song. He was playing one of the tunes they had heard at the theater, that melancholy theme that she had watched him mime with only those graceful fingers and the ghost of an instrument before him.

She could have lost herself in the flutter of Lucien’s fingers across the piano, but she found her gaze wandering upwards until she found his face, as elegant as those hands, as lovely and heartbreaking as the music he played. His eyes were closed, his brows knitted together in thought, in memory. His long hair spilled over one shoulder, the shorter strands brushing his sharp cheekbones, and as she watched him, he tossed those wayward strands away with a shake of his head and a forceful press of the piano keys that carried the tune to its crescendo.

Lucien’s fingers stilled, and as the final notes faded, he whispered, “I wish I could go back and change it.”

His words shook Elain from her reverie, dragging her back to the silent present. “Change what?” she whispered.

“The way we met.” He opened his eyes but did not look at her, staring down instead at his own hands. “I wish I could undo the torture you endured that day. Make it so that we could meet on our own, with clear heads and open hearts. Maybe… if I had only pushed harder, if I had convinced Tamlin not to trust Ianthe…”

The breath that escaped Elain was shaky. “How would you have had us meet?”

He seemed to try to smile, but the sadness in it smote her heart. “Some saccharine way, no doubt. Something out of the old legends: in an enchanted forest or atop a wind-swept hill, just the two of us.”

She managed a little smile. “Or at the theater.”

He huffed out a laugh. “I would've liked that.”

As she watched him squeeze his eyes shut, Elain’s heart tightened like it would be ripped from her chest. She lifted her hand, but she did not know where to put it--she did not want to take his hands away from the piano. She joined her hands back in her lap and whispered, “I wish we could change it, too. But it happened. And if there's one thing I've learned this past year, it's that it does one no good to wallow in what could have been. That's what I did when we were living in that shack. Feyre was the only one of us who was focused on the present, and she was the reason we survived, and she was the one who came out the strongest for it. I won't let myself go backwards. It nearly got me and everyone I loved killed when I got captured outside that war camp. I won't live in the past anymore. I cannot.”

He looked at her sharply then, and it was almost like she could see the shadows of his past in that gaze. Sorrow hung heavy in the air like an echo of the melody he’d just played. She had no comfort she could give him but her own presence, and with a pang to her chest she wondered if that was any comfort at all.

“Thank you.”

Elain jolted at his words, straightening before she even realized how her shoulders had drooped. “For what?”

He toyed with some of the lower keys as he watched her out of the corner of his eye. He still wore that sad smile, and it did nothing to worsen his handsome face. “For bringing me here,” he said. The next words seemed to get caught in his throat, and he swallowed a few times before continuing. “For… showing me that music doesn’t have to only come with bad memories.”

There was a glint in his eye that made him seem far younger than so many centuries, like he could even be younger than Elain. Nerves, she realized. He was nervous.

Elain bit her lip to fight the laugh that threatened to bubble out of her chest. She placed her pointer finger on one of the ivory keys in front of her and pressed down hard, and it produced a much higher note than the ones that Lucien had been teasing. “You play beautifully.” She nudged his shoulder with her own, and of course she was not strong enough to even slightly move him, but he obliged her anyway in swaying to the side as if from the force of her push. “But maybe you could play something happier next?”

He smiled at her, and it was not so sad a smile anymore, and he began to play a fast and whimsical tune that sent his long hands flying across the keyboard. Elain followed the lift and graceful fall of his slender fingers, and she wondered at how a touch that at times seemed so feather light could produce so profound a sound.

In a quick flurry of notes that had his fingers dancing in front of where she sat, Elain felt a tremor in the base of her spine, a flaring heat in the pit of her stomach. She ripped her gaze away from his hands and looked instead to his face; but that did little to alleviate the fire that now spread to the very tips of her toes. The song quickened, and she watched the tendons of his jaw flex beneath his tanned skin, watched his red brows furrow over his sharp features. Part of her, maybe that lingering human part that was all propriety and politeness and certainly not one to stare, thought that she should look away.

But another part of her, quiet as a wild animal and twice as fierce, thought that she did not need to. She did not want to look away.

-

They ate dinner in the city and then wandered the streets, hand in hand. At one point Elain led them into a little bookstore, after noticing how Lucien had paused to stare at its window displays. Elain asked him to pick out some books for her on Prythian history and culture, which he then insisted on buying and carrying back to the townhouse for her.

They paused, as they usually did on nights like these, a few paces away from the townhouse’s front stoop. They faced each other, met each other’s gaze. Lucien swallowed. Elain took a deep breath and waited.

“Well,” he said, “we’d best go inside. I’m sure your sister is waiting for you.”

Elain’s shoulders fell.

“Right,” she mumbled, walking past him and towards the house.

Though she set a brisk pace, Lucien easily matched her, even reaching the front door in time to reach around her and pull it open for her. The motion brought him close to her for a brief moment, so that for one second she could feel his breath hot as a licking flame against her neck.

She whirled around to face him even as he held the door open, and she sucked in a sharp breath at the sight: His full lips were slightly parted, his brows furrowed as his gaze set upon her with all the intensity of the sun. Every emotion she saw in that gaze echoed through the bond, all the fear and sadness and desire spearing straight through to the pit of her stomach.

And his hand remained on the door, the other clenched at his side.

“Elain?” The heavy air between them shattered when Nesta’s voice called from inside the house. “Elain, is everything all right?”

But Elain didn’t answer, and she didn’t look away from Lucien; she snatched the books out of his arms, dipped her chin briefly, and said, “Good night, Lucien.” She left him there on the stoop as she walked inside without so much as a backward glance.

Nesta was waiting in the foyer with a worried frown. As she opened her mouth to speak, Elain cut her off, saying, “I’m _fine_ , Nesta, I’m just tired. Good night.”

She thought about leaving Lucien down there to face an overprotective Nesta alone, but she stopped herself with a weary sigh. Lucien probably didn’t even know why she was upset. _She_ didn’t really know she was upset

Halfway up the stairs, she turned back to Nesta, who was glaring at a wide-eyed Lucien. “Please don’t pick any fights tonight, Nesta.”

Later, after she’d changed into her nightgown and fallen into bed, Elain curled herself around her clenching stomach. She scowled into the darkness of her bedroom. Why _was_ she so angry? Was it because, after all their time together, after all she’d done to show that she was comfortable around him, he still would not so much as hold her hand without her initiating? Would not even kiss her cheek?

Shame flared hot on her face. She was angry with him for being respectful. He was giving her time, and choice, two things that she desperately needed as she processed what this bond would mean for her. It was not fair for her to be angry with him.

Still, the knowledge did not help stem the aching in her stomach, in her chest, in her--

Elain yanked the blankets over her head with a groan. It was a very long time before she managed to fall asleep.

-

She looked down to the piano keys and saw his long, golden-brown hands fluttering across them like a butterfly through a garden. His arms reached around her, lithe but strong. His breath hot against her ear sent a shiver down her spine. “What do you want, Elain?” he murmured.

She shited back, towards that voice--but she was already so close to him. His chest was firm against her back, and _oh_ , he was firm beneath her, too.

Lucien’s lips still hovered achingly close to her ear, tracing the length of it with his heavy breaths. Elain gasped at the faintest scrape of teeth. When he whispered to her again, there was a command in it, a forcefulness that had her back arching. “What do you _need_?”

“More.” The word was little more than a groan from deep within her throat. She let her head fall back upon his shoulder. “ _More_.”

One last, violent chord, and the music stopped. His hands left the keys. One hand went to her stomach, his fingers spread wide, his skin blazing through the fabric of her dress. The touch was nearly a balm for her feverish desires, but not quite, not _quite_ \--

The fingers of his other hand brushed her chin, turned her face towards him, and her heart shattered at the tenderness in his gaze.

And then the hand on her belly began to slide down.

And then Elain opened her eyes to the darkness of her bedroom.

She squeezed her eyes shut and went completely still, her mind fumbling for the retreating shreds of the dream, as if she could drag it back to her. But her heart was beating too fast, her breaths too shallow for her to ever hope to fall back asleep. Her hand had found its way beneath her nightgown and between her legs, her fingers slick with the evidence of her blissful dream.

Elain allowed herself only a few languid strokes before a more prudent part of her brain awoke to send shame twisting through her belly. Surely this would be a horrid breach of trust. How would she feel if she learned he’d pleasured himself with the thought of some fantasy version of her?

Something inside her practically _purred_ at the idea.

With a sharp breath between her teeth, Elain yanked her hand away from her throbbing core. Her nightgown clung to her sweat-drenched skin. It was entirely too hot in her room.

She didn’t bother with a robe as she walked out into the hallway.

She thought about going into the garden, but the rooftop stairway was closer, and she was in desperate need of cold air on her skin. She raced up the stairs as swiftly and quietly as she could and threw open the rooftop door.

The crisp night air was an instant salve upon her flushed skin, and her head tilted back in a shameless groan. As she tried to steady her breathing, she could hear the muffled song of frantic drums.

No, not drums. A heartbeat.

Elain whirled around to find Lucien hunched on the other end of the roof, one hand clenching the ledge that he must’ve just turned away from. He wore only a pair of loose trousers. The muscles of his lean frame were coiled tight, sweat-glistened beneath the moonlight. His hair hung loose upon his shoulders, and his wide eyes bore into hers, one amber brown and one shimmering gold. He looked--

He looked like she felt.

“Oh,” she breathed.

Lucien drew himself upright. “You were angry with me tonight.”

No questions, then, about her wild state. She found herself acutely aware of every bare inch of skin, every goosebump on her body. She went to pull her robe closed before she remembered that she’d not worn one, and so instead she hugged her arms across her chest. “What makes you say that?”

“You’re usually not one for storming out of a room.”

Her blood was still pounding far too hard in her ears, and in more demanding places. She shrugged one shoulder and scowled as she half-turned away from him. “Right, I forgot--sweet, gentle Elain would never do such a thing.”

He frowned. “I never said that.”

“That’s what you think of me, isn’t it? That’s what everyone thinks of me.”

He could have closed the distance between them in a matter of seconds, but his strides were slow as he walked towards her. Her gaze flitted down to his bare chest, to the thin red trail beneath his belly button, before darting back up to his eyes, severe beneath his brows. HIs nostrils briefly flared, as if taking in her scent. “You want to know what I think of you?”

Still taking those slow steps, he spoke in a warm murmur, “Gentle, yes. As often as you can be. And kind, and observant, and bolder than anyone gives you credit for.”

“Bold?” She tried to laugh, in an attempt to diffuse some of the tension wrought in her shoulders; but at his earnest gaze, all she could manage was a faint huff of breath that sounded too much like a gasp. “No one’s ever used that word to describe me before.”

“Aren’t you, though?” Lucien took another step closer to her, deliberate as a stalking predator. His voice was a low rumble that brought heat to her cheeks. “You come to a rooftop in the middle of the night, alone with a son of Autumn. Don’t you know that we have fire in our blood?”

She lifted her chin, even as her heart raced against her ribs. “Are you saying you’re dangerous?”

“I’m a high fae,” he said. As if to illustrate, he lifted his hand and summoned a little ball of flame that pulsed and flickered in time with his heartbeat. “We’re all dangerous in our own way.”

Elain could not tear her eyes away from the fire as it shifted. She gasped as it stretched and morphed into the shape of a wolf, pacing in circles across Lucien’s palm. It stopped and lifted its blazing head to look at her, and then Lucien clenched his fist, snuffing out the flame in a puff of smoke.

“Fire in your blood,” she murmured. She glanced towards the rooftop door, directly to her left. “Yet, for being so dangerous, you’ve done a good job of leaving me a clear escape route.”

With another stride of his long legs, he was close enough for her to feel his breath warm her face. “You think I wouldn’t be able to reach you before you escaped?”

She knew he was trying to scare her, knew that she likely _should_ be scared, and yet… “If you’re trying to convince me to be afraid of you, you’re going to be disappointed. I don’t believe for a second that you would ever hurt me.”

The shadowed intensity that radiated from him melted away as he gave an irreverent shrug. “Of course. I’d be signing my own death warrant, considering the other people who live in this house.”

Elain quirked an eyebrow. “Is that why you’ve been such a gentleman with me? Because you’re scared of my sisters? Is that why you refuse to so much as hold my hand unless I’ve touched you first?”

She held her hands out in front of him. After a moment’s hesitation, he brought his own hands up to hover just beneath hers, barely more than a hair's breadth away. Heat radiated off of his skin, so warm against the chill night air that it brought goosebumps to her arms. She slowly lowered her hands into his and grasped them, savoring the warmth as his fingers enveloped hers. Fire-blooded, indeed.

“I try,” Lucien said, the words as slow and careful as the circles his thumbs traced over her skin, “to treat you that way, because of the choices that were already taken from you. This new body, your powers… a mate. Those choices were made for you. I’ve seen it far too often, especially with females. I never want to see someone else’s decisions forced upon you again. For the rest of your life, I want everything that happens to you to be by your own free will.”

She squeezed his hands as her chest tightened. To expect that she could choose how the rest of her long life would go… it was a terribly sweet idea, and an utterly impossible one. “Isn’t that a bit idealistic?”

“You do seem to bring out the idealist in me.” Elain had never known a smirk to be so gentle. “Please don’t tell anyone. It would ruin my reputation as a cynical bastard.”

She smiled. “You know, for such a dangerous, cynical, fire-blooded faerie--” Elain reached out to brush her fingers against a strand of hair that hung over his temple. Gently, as she felt his racing heart like drums beneath her fingertips, she tucked the hair behind his pointed ear. “You're very kind.”

She heard his response, not aloud but as a thought drifting down the bond they shared, twisting through her veins in waves of sorrow: _If only that were true._

-

Elain drifted between the swaths of fabric that made up the aisle of the boutique. The fabric flowed down from their bolts like veils, and Elain held out her hands to brush them as she walked. Some were coarse with intricate lace, some smooth with gems, some soft and silken.

“So what does this harvest festival entail?” Nesta was asking from where she browsed a few rows down.

“We celebrate the year’s bounty,” came Nuala’s soft reply, “by holding a great feast and giving thanks to those who made it possible. The farmers, the artisans, and the fertile earth itself.”

It had been a week since Elain had met Lucien on the rooftop. Not much had changed since then: they still ate lunch in the garden, still wandered the streets of Velaris at sundown, except for the past two days, when Rhys had needed Lucien for some business with the Summer Court. Neither of them had brought up the moment on the rooftop, though the memory of it ever lurked on the edges of Elain’s mind. Lucien’s behavior had changed little. But more than once, as they sat together, he had turned his hand palm-up as if asking a question, which she would answer by placing her hand in his. More than once, when they’d found their faces close together, and Elain’s eyelashes would flutter and her breath would catch, he’d lean just a bit closer. But never close enough.

“I assume that means there will be food,” said Feyre.

“Yes, the last harvest of the year is always set aside for Harvestmas. There’s also wine, of course, and music and dancing.”

Elain paused to run her finger over a blood-red silk and asked, “Did you not go to the festival last year, Feyre?”

The bolts of fabric were set low enough that she could see them all above the shoulders. She lifted her head to meet Feyre’s gaze. Her youngest sister’s eyes seemed to stare through her.

“You were in Prythian this time last year,” Elain said. “Did they not have this festival in the Spring Court?”

Feyre’s eyes had lost all focus. Elain stepped around the aisle and came to join them, just as she heard Nuala murmur, “It would have been soon after you returned. The courts were still in disarray. Most did not hold the harvest festival.”

Her words seemed to pull Feyre back into the present. “Right.” She blinked and nodded. “Right, that makes sense.”

“I’m sorry,” Elain said, taking her sister’s tattooed hand. “I didn’t mean to…” She squeezed Feyre’s hand. “You don’t have to talk about it right now. But you know, if you ever do, we will always be here to listen.”

Feyre shook her head, frowning. “You’ve been through enough of your own horrors, you don’t need to hear all about mine.”

“Yes,” Elain shot back, “I do.” Because she meant what she’d said to Lucien: she would not go backwards. She would not be the girl who hid from the truth.

Feyre’s trembling lips pressed together before breaking into a smile. She lifted her chin and threw her shoulders back, as if discarding some invisible weight. “Has anything caught your eye yet?”

Elain returned the smile and nodded. She pulled Feyre towards a bolt of fabric that she’d noticed when they first walked in, one of shimmering gold.

“Gold?” Nesta asked.

Feyre put her chin on Elain’s shoulder. “It’s not your normal style.” Her smile turned mischievous. “But I think it suits you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So sorry for the delay with this one! The next chapter will not take nearly as long. :)
> 
> To anyone who's stuck around, thank you so much!


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The second half of this chapter was actually the first thing I had written for this story. Hopefully it was worth the wait! :) Thank you all for your support and your kind words, you have no idea how much it means to me!

Nuala finished shaking out the the skirt and stepped back, nodding with satisfaction. “The gold really does suit you.”

Elain shifted her hips to watch the dress sway, to let the beadwork catch the light. The sparkling beads and the subtle sheen of the fabric made her feel bright as the sun itself. It also called to her mind the sight of light striking an enchanted gold eye.

She wondered if Lucien would notice.

The door to her bedroom opened, and Feyre peeked inside. When she saw Elain, she let out a sigh and leaned her head against the doorframe. “You look radiant, Elain.”

As she walked towards the door, Elain smiled and gave Nuala’s hand a quick squeeze in thanks. Then she said to her sister, “But I could never outshine our High Lady.”

A year ago, perhaps, Feyre might’ve protested, might’ve said that she could never match Elain’s beauty, or anything else to deflect the praise. But now Feyre only looked to the ceiling with a cavalier smile before opening the door wider.

Nesta waited for them in the hallway, looking utterly devastating in a dress of wine-red lace. Feyre took them both by the elbows and pulled them close.

“If this is a festival of giving thanks,” she said, “well, I’m thankful that you’re both here with me. Whole and happy.” She lowered her voice. “At least, I hope you’re happy.”

Elain nudged her with a grin. “Very happy.”

They both looked to Nesta, who stared at the floor even as a tiny smile crept onto her face. “Happy,” she agreed at last, and then looked to Feyre. “And grateful.”

Feyre nodded, and with a smirk and a wink she looked to Elain. “Well then, let’s go. There are three males downstairs who love to talk, and I think it’s time for us to render them speechless.”

Most of Rhys and Feyre’s Inner Circle had already gone to the festivities, but Cassian had lingered at the townhouse. He’d said it was to discuss their most recent mission with Rhys, but he wasn’t fooling anyone, especially not with how his eyes widened as they tracked Nesta down the stairs.

Rhys’s reaction to his mate was different, but no less awed. Even his wings perked up at the sight of Feyre in her black-trimmed silver gown, the inverse of his own elegant suit.

And Lucien--

Lucien looked away before Elain could meet his gaze.

The festival was being held in one of the large markets near the river. They could have winnowed there, but Rhys and Feyre preferred to walk through the streets, hand in hand, returning the many greetings they received from the citizens of Velaris. Nesta and Cassian followed close behind, deep in a conversation that toed the line they had perfected between arguing and flirting.

Elain fell into step beside Lucien, who trailed behind the others. He still had not looked at her, had not spoken a word to her. She cleared her throat and said, “You look quite nice.” And he did, wearing a fine jacket the color of fresh tilled earth over a vest of forest green, both with copper accents. He’d tied his long hair back at the nape of his neck.

“So do you,” he replied. Though their pace was not at all strenuous, he sounded out of breath.

“I don’t know how you can tell, as you haven’t even looked at me yet.”

He winced, and Elain immediately regretted her words. “Forgive me, lady,” he said softly. “The Harvest Festival… in the Autumn Court, its importance is second only to the Equinox. No matter where I am, this festival reminds me of home.”

“You don’t have to go!”

Lucien finally met her gaze, and he looked as though it pained him to do so. Elain swallowed and continued, “You don’t have to go through with something that brings up bad memories. No one would think any less of you.”

He shook his head. “ _I_ would think less of me.”

Neither of them spoke the rest of the way, even as they passed by the little park that Elain had come to think of as “theirs.” It seemed all of Velaris had gathered around this single market square, which was full of tables laden with glazed meats, richly seasoned vegetables, more types of cheeses than Elain had ever seen, and crystal decanters of wine.

Elain followed her sisters as they met up with the rest of the Inner Circle and made their way through the market. Careful as she was with Lucien and food, she still pointed out which foods she thought he should try. She’d learned, in their meals together, that he was fond of spices, specifically the sort that would set Elain’s mouth on fire. She usually avoided spicy food whenever she could, but she found herself desperate to pull Lucien out of the dreadful mood he seemed to have fallen into.

She halted in front of a platter of bright red peppers that had been cut in half and stuffed with cheese and breading. She picked one up and gave Lucien a sidelong glance. His eyes had gone wide.

“Elain, maybe you shouldn’t--”

She forced far more confidence than she felt into her answering smile as she took a quick bite--and instantly had to press her hand against her mouth to stop herself from spitting the blazing thing out.

“ _Wa’er!_ ” she whined around the bits of pepper and breading that she was desperately trying to chew.

“Not water.” She could hear the barely suppressed laughter in his clipped response. “You want milk.”

They must’ve had some milk placed nearby, because he quickly had a glass in her hand. When she’d gotten both the pepper bite and the milk down, she finally opened her tear-filled eyes to find Lucien snickering into his clenched fist.

“How do you eat this sort of thing?” she exclaimed. Her entire face was burning.

“I did try to warn you.”

She lightly shoved his shoulder, but the sight of him laughing, grinning down at her, and after he’d been so somber before… the heat on her face was from something entirely different now.

Cheers and applause drifted from the center of the market square, and they looked to find Rhys and Feyre hopping up onto the edge of the fountain there, both with wine glasses in hand.

“What’s this?” Elain asked Lucien.

“The High Lord typically gives a speech at Harvestmas, encouraging everyone to take account of the blessings of the past year.” Lucien wrinkled his nose. “My father’s speech was always a dull, heavily scripted affair. I assume Rhys does things differently.”

Rhys’s voice carried over the now-silent crowd, and the way he beamed at the people of his city had Elain’s heart swelling with pride for the male who would be as a brother to her. His free hand found Feyre’s and gripped it tightly. “The past five decades have been nothing short of a nightmare for all of us.” She thought she could see Feyre squeeze his hand, and he paused to give his mate an achingly soft smile before continuing, “But everything I endured the past fifty years, I would endure a thousand times more if it would keep all of you safe. You are what kept me going through those dark days.” He raised his glass and called out, “To my Court of Dreamers!”

The crowd cheered in reply.

He gave Feyre a faint nudge, and taking a deep breath, the High Lady spoke: “I’d given up hope. Hope of being happy, of finding my place in this world, of feeling at peace… and then I came to Velaris.” Feyre’s breath caught, even as Elain’s heart clenched again with pride. “This city, and all of you in it, helped me see the future that lay ahead of me. You helped me become the person I am today.” She clinked her glass against Rhys’s, and then lifted it before the crowd. “To new beginnings!”

As the people of Velaris erupted into a fresh wave of cheers, Elain stretched out her hand, seeking Lucien’s--only to discover that he was no longer at her side.

Music had started, rolling drums and vibrant strings, as Elain squeezed between the crowds trying to find Lucien. It was only when she left the market square behind that she spotted him.

He stood upon the empty bridge with his back bowed, his knuckles white as he gripped the stone railing.

“Lucien?”

He didn’t answer her, only dipped his head lower and tilted it away from her.

“Are you going to tell me what’s wrong?” And though she did try, she could not quite keep the accusation from her voice. “I know this festival reminds you of the Autumn Court, and I know that’s a place you’d rather forget, but… but you’ve barely even looked at me all night, and I- I can’t help but think _I’m_ what’s bothering you.”

“I’m sorry,” he rasped.

She walked closer, frowning. “For what?”

“For looking at you the way a starving man looks at a feast.” He half turned towards her, his breathing ragged, his brows knitted together in a mournful expression. “When I saw you tonight in that dress, I thought my heart would rip apart, and it only felt slightly worse than how I normally feel when I look at you. And you deserve better than that. You deserve better than me throwing myself at you like some lovesick animal.”

Another step closer. Lucien flinched as if he wanted to back away from her, but he stood his ground.

“I don’t blame you for it,” she murmured, “not one bit. I know you didn’t ask for this.”

“That doesn’t make it right.”

She stood so close to him now. She placed her hands beside his on the railing, so that she only had to stretch her fingers to brush against his. But she kept them still for now. “You’ve never forced the issue. Never made me feel guilty or rushed or pressured, not once.”

He gave her a wry smirk that held no humor. “Not even when I blurted it out for all of Hybern to hear? How could I possibly deserve all the kindness you have shown, when I couldn't protect you when you needed it most? Just like I couldn't protect--” He silenced himself with a sharp gasp through his clenched teeth. His head drooped so low now that his brow nearly touched the stone railing. His soft voice was laced with bitterness. “It's only a matter of time before I fail you, like I failed her. I can only pray that it doesn't cost you your life. Another death that should have rightly been my own.”

Sighing, she looked away and down into the dark water before them, and she wondered if he would ever forgive himself for what happened that day. If he would ever forgive himself for any of it. A tiny laugh escaped her. “Look at us,” she whispered. “Two people who watched horrible things happen and can’t let go of the guilt. No wonder the Cauldron threw us together.”

Elain returned her gaze to Lucien, and at the sorrow writ on his face she could no longer resist putting her hand atop his, squeezing so tightly her muscles strained, as if her touch could anchor him to this moment. “Maybe it’s time,” she said, “for us to forgive ourselves.”

-

Lucien was drowning.

Drowning in the warm depths of Elain’s eyes, in her scent, in the drums and thrumming strings filtering through the air, in the shadowed eddies of the past. He tore his gaze away from hers to stare down into the midnight waters of the Sidra. Lantern light flickered upon the flowing surface, dancing among the starfield of the reflected sky. He lifted his chin to that glimmering night, and his breath caught in his chest at how bright and numerous the stars were in this court he’d once feared. The beauty of that night sky pierced him like an arrow. Beauty that Jesminda would never see.

She was dead. It would never be all right. He could kill Beron and all his brothers with his bare hands, and it would still not be all right. Feyre’s heart was forever scarred. He could burn Tamlin’s manor to the ground, and it would not undo the injustices that had been committed there. And Elain had endured a torment he could not imagine. He could strike Hybern from the face of the earth, and it would not erase the scars they all carried.

Jesminda was dead. And Lucien was not. He'd watched her suffer, just as he'd watched Elain suffer and been powerless to stop it.

It would never be all right.

The firmament above shone on, as it had for a million years, as it would for a million more. Beauty that would outlive them all.

_I won't let myself go backwards._

He held the memory of Jesminda’s face in his mind. He took her smile, her laughter, her voice, her last heartbeat, and he wrapped it all up. He let Jesminda become a scar upon his heart, as permanent and a part of him as the one upon his face.

Lucien lifted his face to the heavens and drank in their beauty. Because he was alive, and Jesminda was not. Because she had loved the beauty of the world, and he would love it today and everyday forward in her stead. Because that was all he could do for her now.

And that was all right.

A tear slipped from his eye. As it rolled down his cheek, warm lips pressed against his skin to capture it. He leaned into Elain’s touch. The drumming drifting from the plaza pounded through his ears and into his veins, a reminder of what a precious thing it was to have a still beating heart. He was alive. He would make every second count.

Lucien did not recoil, did not hesitate as he put his hand upon Elain’s cheek. The words came out as easy as breathing: “Will you dance with me, Elain?”

Her answering smile was more dazzling than the stars above.

Neither of them had to suggest where to go. It was only a short walk to the little park, with the vibrant chrysanthemums at their feet and the tall sunflowers standing sentinel behind them. The music of the festival carried across the river. Lucien lifted her hand in his and placed his other hand at her waist. Elain let him lead, let him twirl her, and as he lifted her high in the air at the song’s crescendo, she closed her eyes and threw her head back. Lucien was reminded of why he had not let himself look at her earlier this night beyond his first hungry glimpse at the townhouse. He might as well have stared into the sun.

A less lively tune began to play, and Elain wrapped her arm around his waist and drew close.

“I hated this festival,” he said.

Elain blinked suddenly, as if his words had snapped her out of a daze. “Because it reminded you of home?”

He spread the hand at her back to its widest breadth, and sucked in a sharp breath as his thumb brushed bare skin. He’d forgotten how low the back of her dress was. “Mostly. But it was also a reminder of how I had so little to be thankful for. Although I…” He moved his thumb down, away from the skin of her back and onto the fabric of her dress, but not before his eyes fluttered closed for a second as he allowed himself to appreciate the feel of her. “Looking back on it, I had it far better than most. I had a very nice roof over my head and a warm meal every night. I should have been grateful.”

Elain’s own hand traced idle shapes upon his jacket before pressing flat and firm upon his back. “Your comfortable lifestyle doesn’t erase the pain you endured.”

Looking down at her lovely, earnest face, feeling her body so close to his, it made him feel light, too light, as if he would fly out of his skin at any moment. Before he could stop himself, he lowered his head to press their brows together. “That pain is a part of me. It always will be. But I don’t want to exist inside it anymore. I don’t want to live in the past, not when…”

Gods, but she was so close to him. It was as if his whole world had shifted to center on those warm brown eyes. “Not when I have a future to look forward to.”

Her lips parted in a soft gasp. Lucien could feel her quick breaths on his face. She trembled beneath his hands, and if one could die from want of a person, he might drop dead at any moment.

And then she whispered nearly against his lips: “Aren’t you ever going to kiss me, Lucien?”

He tightened his grip on her, if only to keep himself from collapsing.

The drums pounded on in the distance, but Elain and Lucien had stopped moving. “You want to, don’t you?” she asked, and Lucien wished his lips could smooth away the worried little wrinkles on her brow.

“I want…” He slowly closed the distance between their faces, and he let his lips hover just above her flushed cheek, savoring the scent of her before pressing a kiss there. “...to make you smile.” He moved up to kiss her temple. “To make you laugh.” The bridge of her nose. “To make you happy.”

Elain closed her eyes and smiled, breathless and unrestrained. “You’ve already done all those things.”

“Then what else can I give you, Elain?”

She watched him from beneath her lashes. “Do you not know?”

Carefully, as one might hold a baby bird, he brought his hands up to cup her face, and he brought their lips together at last.

Lucien had no words to describe the kiss. It was an aching and a cure. It was a crackling hearth, it was crackling lightning. It made him think he might die; it made him yearn to live.

When they broke apart, Elain’s head dropped to one side with a heavy sigh, and it took all of Lucien’s willpower not to set himself upon her exposed neck. She said in a breathy murmur, “I’ve wanted you to do that for so long now.”

His voice was hoarse when he replied, “You have no idea how much I’ve wanted it.”

“But you never did, even lately when we’ve been…” She reached up to trace his jawline.

“I could get drunk off of you. I didn't want to lose control.”

Her fluttering lashes went still as she broke from the reverie of their kiss. She lifted her head and spoke in a steady voice, “Take me home.”

His spine straightened, and he nodded.

She took his hand. “Winnow us.”

He did not need to be told twice.

-

When Lucien closed the door to the silent townhouse, the reality of the situation sank into Elain’s bones. And she found she was not afraid.

She whirled around to face him. “Will you wait for me upstairs?”

HIs eyes widened, and he only nodded in reply.

She waited until she heard him on the top landing before she ran into the kitchen.

A few minutes later, and after a quick stop by her own bedroom, she found herself approaching the open door to his room. Her arms were full with what she’d gathered, and her heart thrashed wildly against her chest as she closed the door behind her.

Lucien had been pacing beside his bed, his hair unbound, and he froze when he saw her, his gaze going to what lay in her arms.

“Elain--”

“I was scared of you!” she blurted out.

His eyes snapped up from the brown coat draped over her arm--his coat, the one he’d wrapped around her when they first--

“When we first met, I was scared of you.” The words tumbled out of her. “Do you know why?” His eyes were wide with wonder as he shook his head slowly.

She sucked in a deep breath that did nothing to steady her racing heart. “You knelt down next to me, and you put your jacket around me, and I looked up at you for the first time--and you were the most beautiful creature I had ever seen.”

She heard his breath catch in his throat, and on the other end of that tether she felt something like disbelief.

“I thought I must have been put under some thrall. Because how could I think such a thing? How could I be seeing beauty in that awful place? How could that be my first thought when I looked at you, there surrounded by all that blood and heartache? I thought the Cauldron had ripped up and replaced my heart, the same way it did with my body. And then you said that word.”

_Mate._

“And I thought my life was over.”

He lowered his head, squeezing his eyes shut.

“I was ripped away from everything I knew, and now here was this--this devastating creature saying I was his--his mate. As if I belonged to him now. I couldn’t move. I could barely breathe. And before I knew what was happening we were swept away. I was still wearing your coat.”

His lips parted in a shuddering breath that was almost a sob. He looked like he wanted to speak, but he didn’t. She heard it anyway, on the other end of the bond, more as a sensation than any real words: _I’m sorry. I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry._

“Mor took us to a cabin in the mountains. She stayed just long enough to tell us that we were safe and she would be back for us soon, and then she was gone. Nesta set me down in front of the fireplace. She must have asked me a hundred times if I was all right. I never answered. Eventually she went outside and screamed at the sky. Just screamed and screamed. I think she wanted someone to hear her, to come after her so that she could rip them apart. But no one did, so she kept screaming until she lost her voice.

“I don’t know how long I stared at the fire. The fog had settled in around my mind. It was full of voices and places and thoughts and words, so much, so fast, and I was lost in it. But through the fog I caught glimpses of sunlight. I tried to follow the glow, to walk towards the sun, but it seemed like every time I got close, I would get hit by a waves of fear and doubt and sorrow. So I shrank from it.

“I spent those next few weeks lost in the fog. I counted down the days to my wedding. It was the only way I kept track of time. The ring was a weight to keep me on the ground. Nesta was always there, but I hardly saw her through the fog. Hardly saw anything--except that I could see, so very far, and hear so very much. Within my mind and without, swirling through the mists. And then all of a sudden the sunlight filtered through brighter than before. And I knew you’d come.”

His breathing was shallow as he dared a glimpse at her, his shoulders hunched, looking not at all like a centuries-old high fae, but more like a frightened juvenile stealing glances across a ballroom. The whisper of a smile swept through Elain’s face.

“And I was curious. I wanted to see what you were really like. If I still thought you were as beautiful as when I first saw you. One day an image flashed in my head, of you in the library; so I went there. And then you came. I almost couldn’t look at you. But I could hear your heartbeat. I could see it pulsing in the light through the mist.” Her shoulders rose and fell in a heavy sigh. “Do you remember?”

He met her gaze fully. His voice was barely above a whisper when he replied, “I remember all of it. It was the first time you spoke to me. The first time I heard you say my name.”

She nodded sadly. “There was something feral in your eye. Brief, and you tried your best to hide it--the desire. The longing. But it made me remember the life that had been stolen from me. Remember your part in it. And I couldn’t look at your light anymore.”

His shoulders slumped, but he didn’t look away. She felt him say across the bond, _You had every right to hate me._

“But I didn’t!” She took a quick step forward, and his eyes widened at her words. “I didn’t hate you. I didn’t _know_ you. And I could still feel that sadness and self doubt in you. I felt it all too keenly, and it mixed with my own, and I couldn’t bear it. It was all too much, so I tried to shut it out. That day when you left for the continent, when you volunteered to go because you knew you were the only one who could, I almost tried to stop you. Because what if you died out there and you were still so lonely?”

He swallowed. “But you still felt me. While I was gone. I felt you too. Like a distant warmth.”

“You changed while you were gone. There was still sorrow, but it was buried under something else.”

“I had a mission. A purpose.”

“Because that’s what you need, isn’t it?” She took another step closer, close enough to reach out and touch him. Trembling now from head to foot, she _wanted_ to touch him. But she had to speak first, had to lay bare this wound between them because that was the only way it would heal. “You need a purpose. Something more than just patrols through the woods--that was the hole you felt in your heart when you lived with Tamlin. Because you need to exercise your mind like the others exercise their bodies. When you returned from the continent…” She smiled, and the smile widened when she heard his heartbeat quicken at the sight. “I had healed a bit, but so had you.”

“You’d gotten sun and fresh air. You were stronger.” A smile tugged at the corner of his lips. “Strong enough to slay the king of Hybern. Strong enough to save us all.” She ducked her head and blushed. “You know that, don’t you? We would not have won that day if not for you.”

She kept her head lowered, hoping to hide her sheepish smile. “I’d say my sisters did most of the work that day.”

Warm fingers brushed her skin as he tilted her chin up. She gasped at his touch, at his piercing gaze, at the fire that blossomed in her belly. “You are so much more than you’ve made yourself believe,” he murmured.

Her free hand tightened on the coat draped over her other arm. His eyes went to it, and a soft smile spread over his face. “You kept it?”

His fingers still hovered beneath her chin, as faintly as she might’ve touched a butterfly. “It reminded me--of that moment of kindness you showed me. That tenderness within the horror of it all. And lately…” Her lips trembled. She couldn’t quite find her breath. “Lately, it reminds me of your patience. How you wanted to get to know me. How you would have walked away at any moment if I asked you to.”

“I still would,” he rasped, and she saw the pain in his eye. “If that’s what you wanted, I would leave and never return.”

She knew there was a question beneath his words. So she took a deep breath and answered:

“There’s something I want to give you.”

She shifted the coat in her arms to free the hand she’d kept hidden. In it she clutched a napkin, not so tightly as to squeeze its contents. She turned her hand over and let the napkin fall open--

Revealing three ripe blueberries.

Lucien lowered his hand from her face. His metal eye whirred, as if trying to spy some deception. He stared and stared at the berries, and when too many silent heartbeats had passed, she stammered, “They--they’re from the garden. I picked them earlier today.”

“Elain,” he breathed, tearing his gaze away from her hand at last, “do you--”

“I know what I’m doing.” Her voice shook nearly as much as the rest of her, but not with fear. Not anymore. She lifted her head. “I want this. I want…”

She _tugged_.

A trembling gasp escaped him. He reached out a shaking hand towards her face, brushing it faintly over her cheek.

The disbelief etched into his furrowed brows, the searching in his gaze, as if she couldn’t possibly be real--Elain thought her heart might burst from it all.

“Will you take them?” she whispered.

In reply, he leaned slowly forward to press a tender kiss against her forehead. He held there, as Elain breathed in his scent, the closeness of him, until she felt something warm and wet slip between his lips and her skin.

When he at last pulled back, the tear streak from his right eye shining white in the faelights, he took her raised hand in one of his. He carefully picked up all three berries. Elain’s heart fluttered against her chest as one by one he popped each berry into his mouth. Their eyes did not leave each other, until she dared to look at his slowly moving lips. The fire in her stomach began to spread.

“I hope they taste all right,” she said in a rush, unable to tear her gaze away from his mouth. “I know it’s not very fancy, but they were the only things in the kitchen that--”

That mouth suddenly came closer. His broad hands cupped her face. She could feel the juice of the blueberries on his lips as he pressed them against hers.

The kiss was slow and soft and over far too soon. Elain let out a faint whimper as he pulled away, and when she opened her eyes she was met by a fire burning in his.

She pressed her hand to his cheek, and her other arm dropped the jacket she'd been carrying and wrapped around his waist, closing the space between them. She met his gaze steadily.

“I want you to kiss me again. And I don't want you to stop.”

He grabbed the back of her head and kissed her. But there was hunger this time. Lucien was sunlight, but he was also the fire of the Autumn Court, and that fire raged over her now, searing her with every touch, with every movement of his lips, with the tongue that now sought hers.

She moaned against his mouth, and his hand clenched in her hair. She brought her own hands into his hair, twisting those silken strands around her fingers, tugging slightly. An approving sound rumbled deep in his throat. He lifted her with one arm and braced her against the nearest wall. Only when he had her pressed there, held up by his hips, did he break away from her mouth.

Elain cried out in protest, but her cry melted to a gasp as he quickly moved to her neck, kissing, sucking, nipping ever so faintly.

“Elain,” he breathed against her skin. “ _Elain_.”

She lifted her leg to wrap around him, pulling him even closer as she gasped his name in return.

The sound of his name from her lips seemed to ignite him further. He lapped at her neck, clutched at her thigh. His voice was practically a growl as he spoke, “Tell me what you want. Tell me how you want it. Tell me how to please you.” He punctuated each sentence with a roll of his hips, his stiffness pressing against the fire that blazed between her legs. She gripped his shoulders and threw her head back, groaning with each thrust.

Distantly, through the haze of desire that threatened to override all rational thought, she processed his words. And the tiniest drop of panic fell through her stomach.

“I’ve never--” She blurted out the words before she’d even decided how to phrase it.

But Lucien must have caught her meaning, because he went utterly still. Only the sound of their panting filled the quiet air between them.

“Lucien?” she prompted, and she immediately winced at how meek she sounded.

He slowly let her slide down the wall until she was on her feet, and then he backed away. The loss of contact was almost painful. He finally met her gaze, searchingly. “I’m-- I’m sorry.” His voice was strained, and he took many deep, steadying breaths. “You’re not--you’re not hurt, are you? Did I go too far?”

“No!” she said quickly. She clutched the front of his shirt, stepping forward, aching for him to put his hands on her again. “No, _I’m_ sorry, I didn’t want to frighten you, I just… thought you should know.”

He nodded. His russet eye had gone nearly black. “You know, we don’t have to do this. We can stop if you want.”

“ _No!_ ” She surprised even herself with the desperation in her voice. She sucked in a very long breath, and squared her shoulders as she released it. “I knew what would happen. I knew what it meant, to… to accept the bond. I do want this. I just thought you would want to know. So you’d understand, if I’m...” She trailed off, her face burning.

“I am glad you told me.” He tilted his head to try to catch her gaze, as she was now staring very hard at the floor. “If you’re what?”

She twisted her hands and mumbled, “If I’m not very good.”

Lucien didn’t answer right away. Instead he wrapped one arm around her shoulder and put the other behind her knees, sweeping her up. His smile was as warm as the summer sun.

“You’ve already made me the happiest male in the world.” Elain thought she might melt underneath that smile.

And then he set her down ever so gently onto the bed. The throbbing between her legs, having lessened somewhat at the awkward turn in conversation, roared back to life as she watched him stalk over her like a cunning predator. “Now we just have to learn how to make _you_ happy, my sweet mate.”

 _Mate_. That word that had once sounded so abhorrent was like music coming from his lips now.

He was over her fully now, propping himself up on those lean but well-muscled arms. He lowered himself slowly to kiss her neck. “We’ll take a scholarly approach.” His breath was hot against her ear. “Plenty of research.” He snatched her earlobe with his lips, sucking it briefly and drawing a sharp gasp from her.

“Mm,” he said thoughtfully, “that seemed to elicit a positive reaction from the subject. I’ll have to file that information away for later.”

She ran her hands up his taut arms, thrilling at the way the muscles twitched beneath her touch. “Is slow torture always a part of the mating ritual?”

He smiled against her neck before lifting his head to look at her. She heard his breath catch in his throat as he gazed down at her; but that clever smile was back on his face in an instant. “I’m just taking the time to worship you, very slowly. It’s what you deserve for your first time.” He brushed a faint kiss over her lips. “And all the times thereafter.”

Feeling him hover over her, not nearly close enough, barely touching her, was becoming unbearable. She wanted to squirm, to thrust herself up against him, to have him melt against her until they were so entwined they could never be pulled apart. Maybe she could do all those things on her own, but she needed him to understand first. “I won’t break, you know. I trust you.” She reached up to stroke his face, running her thumb over his lips, then across his scar. She brushed her finger down the length of it, from his brow to his jaw, before placing her hand flat against his cheek. He leaned into her touch. “You are my mate,” she said, “and I am yours. I want this, Lucien. _I want you_.”

He brought his hand up to grab hers and squeeze it. He placed a tender kiss upon her palm before pressing her hand to his chest, over his heart.

And then he lunged for her.

His lips were on hers, all fire and hunger once again. She arched her back, and he wrapped an arm around her. That hand gripped her shoulder, and the other one slipped beneath her skirt. Goosebumps rose up in the wake of his fingertips as they traced up her leg, and she shuddered beneath his touch. She wanted to put her hands on him, to feel his warmth and maybe, hopefully, make him tremble as he did to her; but she didn’t even know where to begin, she wanted everything, and as his tongue flicked at her ear, all rational thought escaped her. She grasped at his hair, then his shoulders, then ran her hand down his back.

“Lucien,” she gasped as his lips trailed slowly down her neck, and she stretched to give him better access. She tugged at the fabric that blocked her from further contact.

He nipped gently at the base of her neck before sitting up. He removed his vest, then lifted his shirt over his head and tossed it to the floor. Elain bit her lip and let out a little whimper at the sight. She’d seen him shirtless before, when she’d woken him from that nightmare weeks ago, but she’d kept her gaze averted as much as possible. Now her ravenous eyes could take him in; the muscles of his arms and chest were chiseled but not bulky, a body crafted not for intimidation or brute force, but for agility and secret spaces. Atop those muscles were etched a myriad of scars.

Elain moved to kneel in front of him and, after a moment’s hesitation, gingerly put her hands upon his chest. Lucien sucked in a breath, and she felt a surge of delight--that she could make him gasp with only a touch.

She smiled at him, and then she bent down to press a soft kiss against every scar she could find. She took her time, and there were plenty of scars for her to brand with her lips, and as she worked, she brushed her hands up and down his waist. Maybe it wasn’t the most erotic thing she could have done in that moment, but she knew there would be time enough for that later. Right now she wanted only to soothe every wound he’d been given, to show him that she saw each one, that she knew all of him, and she wanted him still.

“Elain,” he whispered. She looked up to find his head tilted back and his eyes closed.

She straightened and put her hands on his cheeks. When he lowered his head to meet her gaze, she pulled him close so that she could place a kiss upon his brow, where the scar on his face began. She traced firm, lingering kisses all the way down the scar, and as she reached its end, she murmured against his skin, “Beautiful.”

He cupped her face and pressed their foreheads together. Between shaky breaths he spoke, “If I’m beautiful, then there are no words that would do you justice.”

She felt a blush spread over her face. But there was no embarrassment for her anymore, not with him, as they knelt facing each other upon the bed. He had bared himself to her, and she was his mate, but more than that--

“I love you,” she said, and found herself surprised at how easy it was to say at last. She felt a tremor tear through Lucien’s entire body, like a fiddle string plucked with nearly enough force to snap it. She felt it in the bond, too: a shattering and a reforging, as if all the pieces of him had flown apart and coalesced in an instant into something stronger, a scar-torn heart meant only for her.

Brushing her thumb across his trembling lips, she said again, “I love you--for where you have been, for where you are now, and I want to be there for wherever you will someday go.” She bit her lip and added with a little smile, “If you’ll have me, that is.”

“If I’ll have--” Lucien wrapped his arms around her and put his cheek against hers, holding her head tightly against his, as if he could not get close enough. The heat of his trembling laugh tickled her ears. “My dearest Elain, I know you are more observant than that.”

Maybe she should have been more serious, considering the gravity of what she’d just admitted, but a giggle escaped her anyway, and she did not fight it. His bare skin against her made her giddy, made her heart race. She whispered, “Will you help me with my dress?”

He nodded, and she sat at the edge of the bed while he undid the straps at her back. Every time he loosened one, he kissed the skin it revealed, until she was aching to put her hands on him again. When the dress was loose enough, she stood and let it fall to the floor. Taking a deep breath, she turned to face him.

For a long moment, Lucien only stared. His throat bobbed as he stood, and his eyes traveled all over her before settling on her face. It might have been a trick of the light, or her own imagination, but she thought she saw his chest flicker and glow, like a brief image of the golden light that had pulled her from that nightmare all those months ago.

“Please touch me,” she rasped.

He inched closer, towering over her, his breath hot on her face. “Where?”

“Anywhere. Everywhere.”

He slowly placed his hand over her heart. “I love you, Elain. I love all the choices you’ve made, the good and the bad, that turned you into the person you are today.”

She wrapped her arms around his neck. “My mate,” she whispered.

The word sparked a flame in Lucien’s eye. He swept Elain up and onto the bed, and just as she’d asked, he touched her everywhere. His hands grasped her hips, his legs tangled with hers, and his mouth--

Elain moaned as he kissed her breast. His tongue flicked over one of her raised nipples as he brought a hand up to squeeze the other. Grasping the back of his head, Elain moved her body against his. The way she rolled her hips was pure instinct, pure aching to have the cleft between her legs make contact with him.

Lucien’s mouth had left her breasts, though his hand lingered, tracing gentle, agonizing circles around her nipples. He left a trail of kisses down her belly, then lower, so close to where her fire raged; and there he paused, lifting his eyes to hers in a silent question.

“Please,” she whimpered, “please don’t stop.”

His smile took away what little breath she had, and then she couldn’t see his mouth anymore, he’d buried it in her--

Her cry was nearly a scream as his tongue dragged up her core. She bit down on her fist to muffle her next cry as he licked her again, and her entire body trembled. She felt him take hold of her arm, forcing her hand out of her mouth. He shifted, and then his breath was hot on her face.

“I want to hear you,” he said, panting. “I want to hear every sound that sweet voice can make.”

When she felt warm fingers where his tongue had just been, she granted his request. She tilted her head back and let out a guttural groan unlike any sound she’d ever made before. She thrust her hips up against his hand as he stroked her, long and slow. He kissed her lips, and each flick and stroke of his fingers he matched with his tongue against hers.

Through the blinding pleasure that pulsed within her, she noticed that his fingers were moving further down. Slowly he slipped one inside her.

She gasped against his mouth, and he broke the kiss to ask, “Does it hurt?”

Elain could only shake her head. The sensation of that finger inside her, teasing and tentative, threatened to overwhelm her senses. If he could bring her such ecstasy with only a single finger, what would the rest of him feel like? She bit her lip at the thought, and her own hands began to move. Lucien let out a sweet sound of his own when her hands slipped inside his pants and brushed against the length of him.

Emboldened by the lust in his eyes, by the fingers that thrust deeper inside her, she wrapped her hand around his base. She gasped at the size of him, how hard and thick he was, and gave him a gentle squeeze.

He dropped his head onto her shoulder and groaned, “ _Elain_.”

Before she could lose her nerve--was every male this thick?--she whispered into his ear, “Please, I need-- I’m ready--”

He lifted his head and swallowed hard. “Not yet.” He pulled back, out of her grip and out of her, and she cried out at the loss of both. He kissed her neck, her collarbone, her jaw, and said, “We have all the time in the world. And I’m not done tasting you yet.”

And then his mouth was on her again, and his finger was inside her, and it was all she could do to keep from screaming so that all of Velaris could hear her. While his tongue lapped at her, he slipped another finger inside. She groaned at how it made her stretch, at how the slow pumping of his hand and the flicking of his tongue coaxed her pleasure higher and higher. His name was like a chanted prayer upon her lips.

Pressure built between her legs, and all of her muscles tensed, and then--

And then that cruel, beautiful creature raised himself up to give her a devious smile. “I have a dilemma,” he said. The movement of his fingers became slow and torturous. She whined beneath him, not caring at all how pitiful she sounded. “I’m torn, you see.” He leaned in to brush his nose against hers, and he murmured in a thick voice that made her legs quiver. “I want to taste you when you shatter. But I also want to get a _very_ \--” He thrust his fingers hard inside her. “--good look at your face.”

She wanted to make some quip about fae cruelty, or how his cunning mind was always at work; but any sound beyond desperate whimpers was a challenge. When she regained enough composure to finally speak, she said only, “You’re thinking too much.” She reached down and grasped him again. Lucien rewarded her with a low growl in the back of his throat.

For the first time in her life, Elain found herself cursing her virginity, if only because she wanted dearly to know how to make Lucien beg as he had done to her. But meeting his dark gaze, she pushed back her fears, her hesitation, and simply followed her instincts. She squeezed his shaft gently, then moved her grip up and down. His free hand grasped her shoulder as the fingers inside her moved quicker, more forcefully. Her core still throbbed, yearning for that lost contact. So she obliged it, lifting her hips until that tender spot met his tip.

They gasped as one. Lucien rolled his hips against hers in a long, slow movement that dragged his length up her cleft. She threw her head back with a wanton cry.

“Please,” she breathed against his mouth. “Please, Lucien, I need this. I need you.”

A moan tore from his throat as he kissed her. Slowly, agonizingly, he pulled his fingers out of her. Pressing his forehead against hers, he spread her thighs apart and settled his hips between them. He held himself with one hand, and with the other he reached up to stroke her face. The tenderness in his gaze pierced her heart like a dagger.

“You’re sure?” he whispered.

Elain cupped his face with both hands, brushing her thumbs over his cheeks. “Yes. I love you. I trust you. Don’t stop unless I ask you to.”

A hot, shuddering breath tickled her lips. He kissed her again, slow and searing, then he opened his eyes to watch her as he entered her at last.

She clutched his shoulders and gasped. Lucien immediately went still. “Are you all right?”

Elain nodded quickly, and she meant it. Pain was not the right word for it--uncomfortable, perhaps, as her body adjusted to the size of him. He pushed further in, painstakingly slow, and he stroked her hair, her face, her neck, kissing her softly as he went.

She arched her back to try to take in more of him, impatient with the pace her own body was setting. A breath hissed between her teeth at the sensation of him stretching her, filling her. She realized she was shaking from head to toe.

“Easy,” he murmured, kissing her nose. “Just relax. Are you sure you’re all right?”

“I feel-- I feel--” She looked into his eyes, the brown and the gold, his past and his present, his sorrow and his hope, and it was as if eternity stretched limitless before her. The bond between them went taut, not a rope but a bridge of light, something beyond earth and flesh, an infinite link that could not be broken.

“I feel whole,” she said.

Elain didn’t have to ask--she knew from his reverent gaze that Lucien felt all of it, too. He no longer hesitated as he thrust fully inside her. He wrapped an arm around her back to press her tightly to him; his other hand grasped the back of her head as he moved slowly inside her. He breathed her name between kisses.

“Lucien,” she gasped as he sucked her earlobe between his teeth, as he thrust deep inside her. She threw her head back and moaned, “Oh gods, _Lucien_.”

He growled into her neck and quickened his pace. He released her and propped himself up on one arm. His free hand moved down to just above where their flesh met.

Elain cried out as he stroked her core, even as he pounded inside her. She flung her hand above her head to grasp at the pillow behind her. Lucien’s other hand snatched hold of her wrist.

“That’s it,” he panted, twining their hands together as he watched her writhe beneath him. “My sweet mate--gods, you’re beautiful.”

She wanted to say his name, to scream it again and again, but only wordless cries escaped her. His fingers moved with skilled surety. He set a steadily quickening pace with both his hand and his hips.

Elain’s free hand clutched the hair at the back of his head, pulling, drawing a deep groan out of him. She couldn’t keep her eyes off of him: the way his jaw clenched with each thrust; the rise and fall of his shoulders, glistening with sweat; the way the tendons of his arm flexed as he stroked her.

She lifted her hips to meet his, and in a swift motion his hand went from her front to her backside. He squeezed her and pressed her tightly against him. He managed to slam even deeper, and at an angle that sent her legs quivering as pressure built and built.

It was when Lucien bent down to kiss her, slow and tender, that her release burst through her at last.

Elain cried out against his mouth. Lucien continued to pump into her, coaxing the waves of ecstasy. Again, he brought his hand between her legs, stroking hard and fast, and it wasn’t long before she came again. This time Lucien followed her over the edge, moaning her name.

They locked eyes. Lucien pressed his forehead against hers. Their shaky breaths mingled in the scant distance between their lips. He released her hand and stroked her face.

“Are you all right?” he panted. The fear and concern marring his face clutched at her heart like a fist.

Elain brought both hands up, pressing them to his cheeks. She didn’t answer out loud. Instead she sent her response, all the love and comfort she had in her heart, barrelling down the mating bond.

_I’ve never been better._

He let out a trembling, breathless laugh that could have almost been a sob.

Then she saw it, and she knew it was not her eyes playing tricks on her: A glow. Lucien glowed.

It started in his chest and radiated outwards, all the way down to the fingertips that stroked her cheek. It was different from the red embers that smoldered beneath his skin when he used the flames of the Autumn Court. This was something gentler, not meant to burn, but to nurture, to comfort, to light the way.

Lucien didn’t seem to notice it. He only gazed into her eyes as she wiped his tears. She pulled his face down and murmured against his lips, “I’m so glad. I’ll never have to fear the dark again.”


End file.
